Ramcharitmanas row a ruse of BJP, SP for political gains: Mayawati

Samajwadi Party national general secretary Swami Prasad Maurya stoked a controversy on January 22 when he alleged that certain verses in the ‘Ramcharitmanas’ composed by Goswami Tulsidas insulted a large section of the society on the basis of caste.

Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) chief Mayawati on Monday alleged that the recent controversy over ‘Ramcharitmanas’ clearly showed a collusion between the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) the and Samajwadi Party (SP) to polarise people on caste and communal lines before the upcoming elections.

Bahujan Samaj Party chief Mayawati (HT FILE PHOTO)

In a series of tweets in Hindi, the BSP chief alleged, “The BJP’s political identity is of creating new controversies for narrow political and electoral interests. Its involvement in spreading ethnic and religious hatred, hysteria and religious conversions is well known. But the same political colour of SP under the guise of ‘Ramcharitmanas’ is sad and unfortunate.”

“Despite the controversy over the SP leader’s remarks against ‘Ramcharitmanas’ and then the BJP’s reactions to it, it is clear from the silence of the SP leadership that there is a collusion between the two parties so that the upcoming elections can be polarised on Hindu-Muslim hysteria instead of burning public issues,” Mayawati alleged.

“The SP-BJP colluded in the last assembly election in Uttar Pradesh and acted as a complement to each other by making it highly communal through religious frenzy, due to which the BJP came to power here again. It is necessary to avoid falling prey to such hateful politics,” she said.

Samajwadi Party national general secretary Swami Prasad Maurya stoked a controversy on January 22 when he alleged that certain verses in the ‘Ramcharitmanas’ composed by Goswami Tulsidas insulted a large section of the society on the basis of caste. He had also demanded a ban on those verses. In a separate tweet, BSP national coordinator Akash Anand said, “Against religious frenzy, against caste hatred, BSP is the only option for communal harmony.”