Digvijaya accuses RSS, BJP of using British strategy of divide and rule

Bhopal, Sept 7 (PTI) Senior Congress leader Digvijaya Singh on Saturday claimed that the RSS and BJP were following in the footsteps of the British who divided Hindus and Muslims to rule India.

He was talking to reporters at the office of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) here.

Leaders of various opposition parties including Madhya Pradesh CPM secretary Jaswinder Singh, Samajwadi Party spokesperson Yash Bhartiya, former state minister Raja Pateria and others who were part of a fact-finding mission that visited Chhatarpur in the state after violence there on August 21 were present.

“Taking a cue from the Englishmen who divided Hindus and Muslims and tried to rule the country, the RSS, Bharatiya Jan Sangh and Bharatiya Janta Party have spread unrest in the country,” said Singh, a Rajya Sabha member.

The house of a Muslim man who does not have hands was demolished in Barwani district on the charge that he was involved in stone-pelting, the former chief minister alleged.

He had filed a petition before the Indore bench of the Madhya Pradesh High Court in 2021 seeking implementation of guidelines issued by the Supreme Court for maintenance of communal harmony, Singh said.

Minorities were being persecuted in the state, and on the other hand the BJP government has not yet filed a satisfactory reply to his petition, he claimed.

Singh also welcomed the Supreme Court’s recent observations about ” bulldozer justice” in response to Public Interest Litigations, and said he was consulting his lawyers to intervene in the case.

Stone-pelting took place in Chhatarpur in Madhya Pradesh on August 21 during the Muslim community’s protest against controversial remarks of Hindu preacher Ramgiri Maharaj, leaving several police personnel injured.

The house of the main accused in the case was demolished following the incident.