Southern States - Andhra Pradesh   

Sangh Parivar accused of destroying plural values

By Our Staff Reporter

HYDERABAD OCT. 27. The ideology of violence is getting institutionalised in the country's structure, warned Ramon Magsasay award winner, Sandeep Pandey, at a lecture on "Challenges of Communalism,'' organised by Harmony Concepts here on Sunday.

Mr. Pandey put the blame for this on the "Sangh Parivar'' which was "cutting the roots of our culture of tolerance and destroying our civilisational values of plurality.'' He openly criticised the role of leaders of the National Democratic Alliance allies like Chandrababu Naidu.

Placing himself in the "alternative political space'' which had stayed away from the politics of votes and power, he said the ordinary people had become disillusioned with the politics of hate and murder of the Sangh Parivar. Mr. Pandey spoke about the complete isolation of the VHP and its allies in Ayodhya town on the very "Ram Temple'' issue which they had used to come to power. All the maths, mahants and temples of Ayodhya had disassociated themselves from the VHP and had come together with leading Muslims of the town to form a Committee for Communal Harmony, he said.

But with State power in their hands, the Sangh Parivar were injecting the ideology of violence into not only the State institutions but into the very sinews of society, he said.

Taking exception to the role of the Gujarat Government and the support to it by even the Prime Minister, he said he was ashamed to call himself a Hindu, if his religion could be used for murder and intolerance. According to him, the ideology of violence was being reinforced in our society through the communal killings and hate campaigns, and by designating weapons of mass killings as epitomes of Indian scientific achievement.

Terming nuclear bombs as weapons of zero military utility, Mr. Pandey, a former nuclear physics researcher in the University of Berkeley, U.S. said while they had not helped protect our borders, they were already killing people in Jaduguda where the uranium ore was mined.

Likening the Sangh Parivar's assault on democracy, tolerance and plurality to the Emergency, he said "then we were only pitted against one individual, today the fight is against a well-entrenched organisation.'' He called for a united stand against the politics of communalism represented by the Sangh Parivar.

The Andhra Pradesh Minister for Revenue, Ashok Gajapati Raju, presided over the function.

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