Someone in Parivar feels bad about India Shining

Everytime the Opposition parties have pointed out something along these lines, the BJP has summarily dismissed them, saying they should be more proud of the country’s ‘‘achievements’’.

However, Singhal said he didn’t understand ‘‘this feel good’’. ‘‘Atal Behari Vajpayee bolten hain ki sab chakkit hain aur Sonia Gandhi bolteen hain ki sab bhramit hain (Vajpayee says everybody is astonished with the developmental works, Sonia Gandhi says everyone has been misled). I don’t know anything anymore.’’

At least among the Hindus, Singhal added, feel good was missing altogether.

Yesterday, at Niwaranpur, he advised VHP workers not to go by parties but elect candidates who support ‘‘the Hindu cause’’. ‘‘No matter which party they belong to, elect those candidates who work and champion the cause of Hindus,’’ he said.

The VHP president also attacked the BJP government in Jharkhand, calling it ‘‘most unfortunate’’ that Arjun Munda had not enacted a law to stop cow slaughter. ‘‘Even Jayalalithaa was much better in the sense that she had at least put a ban on conversion.’’

Singhal expressed disappointment that even the NDA Government, despite a five-year reign at the Centre, had not been able to live up to ‘‘expectations’’. These, according to him, were to drive illegal migrants from Bangladesh out, stop infiltratration, ensure rehabilitation of Pandits in Kashmir, and ban cow slaughter and conversion.

Targeting Sonia, the VHP leader accused the Nehru family of ‘‘patronising’’ Christian missionaries to gain political mileage. However, he claimed, the ‘‘monopoly’’ of missionaries in the field of social work had been broken by the VHP across the country. The VHP, he said, was running 1,200 single-teacher schools throughout the country.

Singhal also hailed Nepal’s King Gyanendra as a leader of the world’s 90-crore Hindus. ‘‘He (Gyanendra) should strive to bring the Hindus under one umbrella and he should lead them in a sammelan in New York next year so that the world gets a message that like Christian and Islamic superpower, there is also a Hindu power.’’