Eye on polls, JD-U opens Jinnah debate again

The meeting is not being held under the JD(U) banner, but the party’s imprint is clear. The seminar is being organised by the South Asia Friendship Forum headed by JD(U) secretary general K.C. Tyagi. The only politicians listed as speakers are JD(U) leaders Sharad Yadav and Nitish Kumar, both keen on shoring up their ‘‘secular’’ credentials ahead of the Bihar elections.

Other speakers include Kuldip Nayar, M.J. Akbar and Ved Prakash Vaidik and activist-academic Anand Kumar.

The seminar aims to show that Jinnah was not the chief person responsible for Partition. Fernandes has made this point before, but he has also said Jawaharlal Nehru and the Congress leadership of the time were largely to blame.

The JD(U)’s efforts to enter the Jinnah debate — at a time when the RSS top brass is meeting in Surat to discuss L K Advani’s ‘‘revisionist’’ views on the subject — can also be construed as indirect support for the BJP chief who is under fire from Parivar hawks.

The JD(U) is keen on retaining, if not enhancing, the Muslim vote it received during the February polls in Bihar and its leaders want to signal that though they are ‘‘politically allied’’ with the BJP, they are ‘‘ideologically distant’’ from the RSS, sources said.

Elsewhere, it was quiet in the BJP today. Though a section of the BJP had said Sudheendra Kulkarni would be sacked after his letter to Advani “leaked” yesterday, no action was taken today.