Sangh Parivar covertly propagating Hindutva agenda: CPI-M

BJP's prime ministerial nominee Narendra Modi's candidature from Varanasi is "laden with an ominous political message" of the Sangh Parivar covertly propagating the Hindutva agenda, CPI(M) said today.
"The announcement of Modi as the BJP candidate from Varanasi is part of the script written by the Sangh combine for Uttar Pradesh which has been extended to Bihar too.
"While there will be no overt display and campaign on the Hindutva agenda given the fact that it had failed to enthuse people in the past one and a half decades in UP, the same political message is being conveyed covertly and in a subterranean fashion," CPI(M) General Secretary Prakash Karat said here.

In an article in the forthcoming issue of party organ 'People's Democracy', he said "all old faces who figured in the aggressive Hindutva campaign for Ram Temple are back in the fray."
While Kalyan Singh has rejoined BJP which has fielded his son, Uma Bharti and Sakshi Maharaj were also contesting the elections from UP. "Modi who proudly calls himself a 'Hindu nationalist' will be the spearhead in this battle," he said.
The fight was not just against Modi but against entire Hindutva forces "who are seeking to once again acquire dominance in the biggest state", he said.

Recalling that Varanasi, along with Ayodhya, was on the agenda of the VHP and Sangh Parivar in 1991, he said "there is a darker and more menacing symbolism in Modi contesting from Varanasi apart from fighting a second seat in Gujarat.

"What is being overlooked or being deliberately swept off the picture, is the history of communalism and the brazen efforts to instigate violence and communal polarisation in Uttar Pradesh in which Varanasi was a main target."
Karat regretted that several parties like SP, BSP, AAP and Congress were pitted against Modi and said had there been an agreement for a common non-Congress secular candidate, the CPI(M) would have considered withdrawing from the fray.
"In the absence of such a united platform, it is essential that the Left contest the seat and mount an effective political campaign to expose the RSS-BJP game-plan," he said.

Hiralal Yadav, a PhD from Banaras Hindu University and a mass leader, is CPI(M) candidate from Varanasi.