‘Don’t call them Hindu terrorists’

Neither the BJP nor the RSS will defend any radical element among its cadres, but will object against dubbing Hindu groups as “Hindu terrorists”, says Yashwant Sinha.

Neither the BJP nor the RSS will defend any radical element among its cadres, but will object against dubbing Hindu groups as “Hindu terrorists”.

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Senior BJP leader Yashwant Sinha said the Congress-led UPA government had all powers to decide who was a terrorist and act against him or her, but it was wrong to use the term “Hindu terrorists” for the alleged extremists arrested on charges of the Malegaon blasts.

Questioning the move to equate Hindu radicals with Islamist terrorists, he said, “Some sections are trying to malign the majority community for vote-bank politics. What percentage of Hindu extremists have been found to be behind terror acts?”

Sinha said, “Our leader, L.K. Advani, and the BJP have always held that a terrorist is a terrorist irrespective of his caste or religion. We are objecting to the term Hindu terrorists.”

Sinha said, “Investigations should happen but the whole majority community is being assailed. We object to the ultra-secularists. We object to what Brinda Karat (of the CPI-M) said in the House yesterday that it was Hindu terrorism.”

“(When) Vaiko has been arrested because he made a speech in support of LTTE, why haven’t those people been arrested who are speaking in favour of SIMI. This is the level that vote-bank politics has reached, by condemning the majority, one seeks to gain the minority vote,” he said.

Meanwhile, the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) said it was not a terror outfit. “We have requested a meeting with the Anti-Terrorism Squad for clarifications on whether it named our organisation in relation to the Malegaon and Modassa blasts,” ABVP national vice-president Milind Marathe said in Mumbai on Friday.