The Hindu : VHP accuses Vajpayee of 'criminal negligence'

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Mar 01, 2002

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VHP accuses Vajpayee of 'criminal negligence'
By Anjali Mody

NEW DELHI, FEB. 28. An unrelenting Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) accused the Prime Minister, Atal Behari Vajpayee, of ``criminal negligence'' and held the Union Government responsible for the attack on the Sabarmati Express in which 57 people were killed.

The VHP's joint general secretary, Omkar Bhave, told presspersons, ``if the Government had taken the right steps this would not have happened.'' Asked if the VHP was asking the Government to resign, he said, ``resignation is not the solution to all problems.''

Mr. Bhave said what had happened in Gujarat since the attack on the train ``is a reply... we are not taking it lying down.'' The VHP was warning the Government that if it did not act there would be riots across the country. ``What is happening in Gujarat will spread to all parts of the country.''

The Union Home Minister, L.K. Advani, did ``bak bak (talked nonsense) on national security. He says terrorism is on its last leg while it is growing.'' The Government had done nothing to contain terrorist activity in the country and the attack on the Sabarmati Express was ``the work of the ISI,'' Mr. Bhave said.

`Temple campaign will continue'

The temple campaign would continue as planned, with the relay of people going to Ayodhya and back. There was no plan to send a larger number of volunteers. Any change in the plan would be ``at the direction of sants who are wiser than the Prime Minister.'' Mr. Vajpayee should appeal to the sants if he wanted a change in the direction, he said.

Neither the Prime Minister, nor the Home Minister had ever told the sants what the circumstances were although the sants had ``gone to them time and time again''. ``The style of the two is to evade the whole thing ... how not to give the land to the VHP0 .. how to appease the minorities,''Mr. Bhave alleged.

He brushed aside Mr. Advani's statements about the significance of the Ram temple movement to the BJP and his part in it saying, ``has he ever placed a formula in front of us .. for two years we have been standing on his head .. in this time has he ever said do it this way or do not do it this way.''

Mr. Bhave said there would be a meeting of sants in Ayodhya on March 14 when a final announcement would be made about the events of March 15.

The VHP has called for a ``nation-wide bandh .. primarily in North India'' to protest the attack on the Sabarmati Express. Announcing this, Mr. Bhave said essential services and school children who had exams would be ``exempted'' from the bandh.

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