BJP in Parivar footsteps over AP’s Muslim quota

The Andhra Pradesh decision — to provide five per cent reservation to Muslims in jobs and education — has just given the BJP an op...

The Andhra Pradesh decision — to provide five per cent reservation to Muslims in jobs and education — has just given the BJP an opportunity to demonstrate its commitment to Hindutva.

The party is gearing up to go to town charging the state Congress government with appeasement of Muslims. Party president M. Venkaiah Naidu today vowed to launch a nation-wide movement to press for a reversal of the Andhra decision and promised to come out with a protest programme against the move within and outside Parliament soon. Sources said the BJP leadership sees this issue to be as potent for the mobilisation of mass opinion as the Shah Bano case, which proved to be a turning point in favour of the party.

The entire Sangh Parivar appears to be closing its ranks to corner the Congress over Muslim reservation. While the RSS has registered its opposition, the VHP has launched a week-long programme of country-wide demonstrations from today. By the time the BJP steps in, the VHP would have already prepared some ground for it. The outfit indicated yesterday that it may also move the court on the issue.

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Naidu termed the Andhra decision ‘‘anti-national’’, which ‘‘will sow the seed for the growth of a new communal movement inspired by the two-nation theory’’. He reminded the Congress that leaders like Jawaharlal Nehru, Sardar Patel, Rajendra Prasad and B.R. Ambedkar had opposed religion-based reservation.

	PIL challenges YSR’s reservation order

			• HYDERABAD: The HC on Friday held that all actions taken by the state government, relating to its order providing reservation to Muslims, will be subject to the court’s order on a PIL challenging the validity of the said order. The petitioner claimed the government has not considered the impact of the order on other Backward Classes or poor Muslims. —PTI

He said: ‘‘This u-turn is the outcome of the pseudo-secular mindset of present-day Congress’’, which was ‘‘likely to be emulated by other governments led by parties locked in competitive pseudo-secularism.’’ The BJP leader also sought to point out a fear of loss for SCs, STs and OBCs by arguing that Muslim reservation could eat in to their share as total reservation had to be capped at 50 per cent.

The BJP stand on the issue obviously marks the end of its flirtation with the Muslim community, which started in the run-up to the Lok Sabha polls.

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