Options open but BJP pins hopes on talks

Party sources said today, ‘‘We are hopeful of a positive outcome from the Shankaracharya’s parleys with Muslims.’’ As for Kashi and Mathura, they said: ‘‘We don’t want to say anything. We may, perhaps, say something only after the July 6 meeting of the AIMPLB.’’

The Ayodhya issue, according to them, can be resolved by adopting any of the three courses — mutual negotiations, court adjudication and a legislation. The third course is ruled out because the BJP does not have the requisite strength in Parliament.

The litigation being a long-drawn process, the party feels the negotiations initiated by the Shankaracharya with the AIMPLB can bring in positive results within a short span of time.

Keen on retaining the party’s appeal among Hindus, BJP president M. Venkaiah Naidu utilised a meeting of convenors of state cultural cells at the party headquarters to underline that ‘‘we are not ashamed of our Hindutva ideology, nor are we apologetic about it.’’

He went on to claim that ‘‘in the pre-Independence days, all Congress leaders were using thoughts of cultural nationalism. But, after the advent of pseudo-secularism, political parties started shying away from this nationalist thinking.’’ However, he hastened to add that ‘‘Hindutva is not an election issue.’’

Pseudo-secularists, according to him, are the biggest danger to national integration and ‘‘we should take it as a challenge and defeat them in every form.’’