All believers welcome to our fold: BJP

Thiruvananthapuram: Asserting that Sabarimala issue was evolving into a fight between believers who are opposed to the entry of young women to the hill shrine and non-believers who supported it, BJP national general secretary P K Krishnadas, on Wednesday, called upon all believers, including leaders and workers of the Congress, to rally behind his party or the NDA.
“The Congress party in Kerala is not anymore capable of fighting the CPM, which has a hidden agenda of destroying the customs in Sabarimala. A majority of the rank and file of the Congress is already flocking to the BJP, and now the leaders should follow suit to try out a ‘Tripura model’ to oust the CPM in Kerala,” he told reporters here on Wednesday.

Referring to AICC president Rahul Gandhi’s statement supporting entry of women of all age groups in Sabarimala, Krishnadas said the Congress party’s state leadership should clarify whether they stood with their president or believers. “If they are true believers, they cannot support Rahul Gandhi and instead should accept the leadership of BJP president Amit Shah who has made a strong statement in favour of believers,” he pointed out.

He also said that the AICC president was acting at the behest of the central leadership of the CPM, “for whom Lord Ayyappa who shattered the party’s foundation, including the Marxian theory of dialectical materialism, is the number one enemy in the state”.

He alleged that the CPM and chief minister Pinarayi Vijayan had a hidden agenda of bringing women from other states to desecrate Sabarimala temple. This was the reason why they convened a meeting of ministers from neighbouring states. But the agenda was shattered because the ministers kept away from the meeting, he added.

“The absence of ministers from other states in Wednesday’s meeting reflects the sentiments of Ayyappa devotees from those states. This is a victory for believers,” Krishnadas said.

On NDA’s planned ‘Rath Yatra’ in the state from November 8 to 13, Krishnadas said the alliance was planning to bring in around 50,000 women on the concluding day of the yatra.