Patch up now,Sangh tells VHP,BJP

Party sources said on condition of anonymity that some VHP functionaries might even land plum posts in the state BJP.

There are instances when Parivar men took over the reins of the BJP in the past.

An exercise in this regard has already begun with some BJP municipal councillors attending meetings at VHP headquarters.

One such meeting was held at the Vanikar Bhavan last week where AMC councillors attended a meeting for Gau Yatra arrangements.

Such meetings used to be held as a matter of routine until 2002,till Modi took over as the Chief Minister and the VHP office ceased to be the venue for such meetings.

Former Mayor Amit Shah said it was a purely a Parivar meeting and that councillors had attended it as part of the planning and arrangement of the yatra.

Incidentally,RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat’s efforts at patch up was confirmed by a BJP functionary who said the former had met Togadia and Modi separately at different places on different dates.

Besides Bhagwat’s visits,VHP president Ashok Singhal also withdrew his caustic remarks against Modi ahead of the Lok Sabha elections.

Singhal had declared his full support to “brother Modiji” whom until the other day he had called “Ghazni” for ordering the demolition of illegally built temples in Gandhinagar.

Incidentally,Singhal has already declared that the VHP will support the BJP in the Maharashtra Assembly elections.

Togadia did not respond to phone calls,but Mehta said he would not want to comment or offer views on this because “I am sick these days.”

BJP spokesman I K Jadeja admitted there might be difference between individuals for personal reasons but the situation keeps changing.

“What matters is the ideological unity which is always there between the two organizations”,he said.

He added that in a society,all communities have a presence and he will not comment on the possibility of inductions from the VHP into the new BJP organisational setup by the year-end.