Togadia resigned from the organisation last week after his nominee for the post of international president lost in an election held after five decades.
New Delhi: The new international working president of the Vishva Hindu Parishad has said that the organisation is at a loss to understand why his predecessor Pravin Togadia is upset with it.
Togadia resigned from the organisation last week after his nominee for the post of international president lost in an election held after five decades.
“What his problems with us are, only he can explain,” said Alok Kumar, adding that the VHP had no problems with him.
Talking to ThePrint, Kumar also said a Ram temple would be built on Ayodhya’s ‘Ram janmabhoomi’ in two years. “The title dispute is in court. We are very hopeful that the verdict will be in our favour. If not, there’s always Parliament,” he added.
Cracks in the parishad
In the election for the post of president last week, Togadia’s nominee, incumbent Raghav Reddy, got only 60 votes. Former high court judge and former Himachal Pradesh governor V.S. Kokje won with 131 votes.
Moments later, Togadia announced his resignation from the VHP, saying he would continue to fight for “Hindu causes… especially Ram temple in Ayodhya”.
Before the organisational election, Kumar said, the VHP had made every attempt at building consensus “as has been the norm”, but Togadia didn’t agree. “We got to know about his resignation through the media. But is this how a democracy works, that you lose a poll and quit?” Kumar added.
The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), which had drafted Togadia in the VHP in 1983, is said to have been displeased with his working style as well as his repeated attacks on Prime Minister Modi and his government over, among other things, the delay in the construction of the Ram temple. The RSS had reportedly also asked him to step in line.
Togadia has been complaining for a long time that the BJP, despite its majority in the Lok Sabha, had put the Ram temple issue on the backburner. He is also reportedly upset about the BJP not working for another manifesto promise – abrogating Article 370, which grants special status to J&K.
Kumar said, despite the differences, VHP members had been instructed not to talk about Togadia in “a loose manner”. “It is not our culture to talk the way he is. He led our movement for a long time,” he added.
Brickbats for Congress
Kumar also weighed in on what some see as the sudden religiosity of opposition leaders Rahul Gandhi and Mamata Banerjee. He said the Congress president’s recent visits to temples and the West Bengal chief minister’s Ram Navami celebrations were inspired by the realisation that “people will not tolerate insult to Hindu culture”. “They also know that, to survive politically they have to prove their ‘Hinduness’,” he added.