BJP launches poll campaign in UP; pledges to build Ram temple

AGRA: BJP on Sunday kicked off its election campaign in Uttar Pradesh with its top leaders pledging to construct the Ram temple at Ayodhya and attacking the UPA government for indulging in politics of appeasement and failure to curb price rise.

Party leaders L K Advani, president Rajnath Singh and Kalyan Singh, along with a host of leaders, launched the campaign by addressing rallies at Agra, Jhansi and Kanpur respectively.

BJP general secretary Arun Jaitley said in Lucknow that Kalyan Singh will be the party's chief ministerial candidate for the crucial seven-phased assembly polls beginning April 7.

Crediting the saffron party's rise to power at the Centre to the Ayodhya campaign, Advani told a large public meeting in Agra that "Ram temple objective is yet to be completed".

The former deputy prime minister, who referred to Rahul Gandhi's remarks on the Ayodhya issue without naming him, cited a cartoon in a magazine of the young Congress MP, saying "The cartoon carried a remark that had that very family been active in the 12th century, Babri (mosque) would not have ever been erected".

In Kanpur, Kalyan Singh said BJP was committed to construct a Ram temple at Ayodhya. "This is not an issue linked to politics. It involves the faith of crores of people across the country," he said.

In Jhansi, Rajnath Singh, accompanied by ally JD-U chief Sharad Yadav, attacked the UPA government for failing to curb rising prices and indulging in appeasement politics of minorities.

The BJP chief termed both SP and BSP as "caste-based opportunist" parties which are not bothered about the state's development.

The party launched its campaign simultaneously in 11 places in the state with MP Sushma Swaraj joining a rally in Kanpur with Kalyan Singh and former BJP president M Venkaiah Naidu addressing a meeting in Varanasi.

"India is primarily Hindu and that is why it does not make any distinction between its people," Advani remarked, maintaining that the results of Uttar Pradesh polls would be a pointer to which party or group would rule the country after the next Lok Sabha elections.

"The decision of the voters of Uttar Pradesh will be a signal who will rule New Delhi," he said.

Describing votebank politics, corruption and crime as three main enemies of good governance, the BJP leader attacked Mulayam Singh Yadav over the Nithari killings, which, he alleged, had brought disrepute to the state government internationally.

Advani and other leaders squarely blamed the state government for the deteriorating law-and-order situation.

They also focussed on issues like criminalisation of politics, making it part of their election plank.

In Lucknow, Jaitley alleged that no section of the society was safe in the SP regime.

The party has given the slogan "parivartan hai sankalp, BJP hi hai vikalp" in the polls.