‘What’s your contribution to Ram Janambhoomi movement?’: Raut hits back at BJP’s Girish Mahajan

Mahajan had said that Uddhav should not feel bad about not being invited as he was an ordinary MLC and the invite was only for VVIPs. “The government is only inviting VVIPs for the inauguration. Uddhav Thackeray played no role in the kar seva, or even in the process of building the temple. It seems the government has, therefore, not invited him. He should not feel bad about it. I had done kar seva several times and was also lodged in jail whereas Uddhav was only sitting at home… he has not even visited Ayodhya,” Mahajan said.

Mahajan also said that around 8,500 people were invited for the inauguration, and while Uddhav was in the list, MNS chief Raj Thackeray has been invited by the Centre.

When the VVIP guest list for the temple inauguration event was released, Sena (UBT) leaders slammed the government for not including Uddhav. On Monday, Raut claimed that Uddhav was not invited due to BJP’s reluctance, and that those who had contributed to the struggle were excluded, while others who had no involvement were celebrating.

Raut also pointed out that senior BJP leaders such as LK Advani and others had played a major role in the Ram Mandir movement, and not the current BJP leaders. He also hit out at the BJP over trying to portray Prime Minister Narendra Modi as the saviour. “It seems the only VIP devotee of Lord Rama is Narendra Modi. BJP has printed a poster depicting Modi walking Lord Rama by the finger to the Ram temple. This poster will hurt the sentiments of crores of Ram devotees. When the struggle for Ayodhya was underway, these VIP devotees ran away, shrugging off the responsibility for the fall of Babri Masjid,” Raut said.

“It was Bal Thackeray who came forward and said if the Shiv Sainiks had demolished Babri, he was proud of them. Balasaheb took that responsibility. All these cowards who fled after the collapse of Babri should not teach us Hinduism. They became jittery after the fall of Babri. So we know who is the VIP and who is the hypocrite. Also, no one needs to invite Uddhav since we were in the Ayodhya movement before BJP,” he said.

Earlier, Deputy CM Devendra Fadnavis had said that those who were asking if the Ram Mandir was anyone’s private property were those who kept claiming to build the Ram Mandir, but never gave any schedule or date. He also dared them to come to Ayodhya on January 22 to see the Ram Mandir.