RSS slams Tablighi Jamaat for not calling off event

All programmes of the Sangh, including the meeting of its highest decision-making body and the annual training programs have been cancelled following the corona pandemic, said Manmohan Vaidya, Rss joint general secretary.

The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) on Monday in a veiled attack on the Tablighi Jamaat said, the organisers should have been “sensible” and called off the congregation in Delhi’s Nizamuddin which had in attendance several people with travel history from, Covid-19 affected cases.

New Delhi, India - March 31, 2020: People who took part in a Tablighi Jamaat function earlier this month walk to board buses that will take them to a quarantine facility amid concerns of infection, on day 7 of the 21 day nationwide lockdown imposed by PM Narendra Modi to check the spread of coronavirus, at Nizamuddin West in New Delhi, India, on Tuesday, March 31, 2020. (Photo by Ajay Aggarwal/ Hindustan Times) (Ajay Aggarwal/HT PHOTO)

Addressing the media through video-conferencing, joint general secretary of the RSS, Manmohan Vaidya said all programmes of the Sangh, including the meeting of its highest decision-making body and the annual training programs have been cancelled following the corona pandemic.

Responding to a question on the congregation that took place in Delhi even as the government had issued orders preventing large gatherings, Vaidya said there government orders against any public gathering were in force and the organisation should have refrained from congregating.

“The spread of the virus has definitely increasing because of the event Tablighi Jamaat organised in the capital. Everyone agrees with that… If their leadership would have taken a decision on time and cancelled it on time it would have been good,” he said.

On Sunday the health ministry said the rate of doubling of Corona cases was now 4.1 days, but if the cases linked to the Jamaat would not have happened then it would have been 7.4 days.

On Monday Vaidya said that the RSS has taken a decision to call off its training camps for the first time in its history. Earlier the Sangh had cancelled its Pratinidhi Sabha in Bangalore that was scheduled for March 15-17.