US EDITION
COLUMNISTS
DIARY
SPECIALS
INTERVIEWS
CAPITAL BUZZ
REDIFF POLL
DEAR REDIFF
THE STATES
YEH HAI INDIA!
ELECTIONS
ARCHIVES

Search Rediff

Congress resurrects Staines to nail BJP

Tara Shankar Sahay in New Delhi

The Congress, if it comes to power, will consider banning the Sangh Parivar for preaching communal hatred that resulted in the heinous murder of Australian missionary Graham Staines and his children, party spokesman Kapil Sibal said on Tuesday.

Launching a frontal assault on the Bharatiya Janata Party and its affiliate organisations like the Bajrang Dal and the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, Sibal left no doubt that his party would capitalise on the Sangh Parivar's communal outlook and "ideology of hate".

He said the Atal Bihari Vajpayee government had the Wadhwa Commission report on the Staines murders by January 31. It should have been made public after the 13th Lok Sabha was constituted.

"But the BJP, like in the Kargil case, does not want to let go of any opportunity for undue electoral gain and has selectively highlighted the report without distributing any copies to Opposition members," Sibal said.

He pointed out that the report had been placed in the library of Parliament without the Lok Sabha speaker's permission. Thus, the BJP-led government had trampled upon conventions, he charged.

Underlining that the BJP regards the Kargil victory as its own, Sibal said Union Home Minister Lal Kishenchand Advani would now regard the Wadhwa Commission report as "the victory of the Bajrang Dal".

Substantiating this remark, he said that after the brutal murder of the Staines family, the home minister had, before investigations began, publicly proclaimed the Bajrang Dal innocent.

Sibal hastened to add that he did not disagree with the report. But he expressed surprise that the principal accused, Dara Singh, was being protected by the people who had perpetrated the crime and had not yet been arrested.

He said Dara Singh was only an instrument in the murders; the actual perpetrators are still free.

Quoting from the report that the murders were the result of "misplaced fundamentalism", Sibal emphasised that this was the hallmark of the BJP and its front organisations. It was at this juncture that he stated his party would consider banning the Sangh Parivar.

The Congress spokesman said his party would like Dara Singh to be prosecuted so that his links with the BJP come out in the open. "There is no doubt that the BJP and its frontal organisations like the Bajrang Dal and RSS are a threat to the country," he asserted.

According to Sibal, in the course of inquiry, Justice D P Wadhwa appointed an independent, high-level investigation team, headed by Indian Police Service officer Padam Singh and five senior police officers. Three of the conclusions reached by the team are:

i) Rajinder Kumar Pal alias Dara Singh is an activist/supporter of Bajrang Dal. But there is no documentary evidence that he is a member because "the Bajrang Dal does not have a list of members".

ii) Dara Singh had campaigned for the BJP during the 1998 parliamentary election.

iii) Dara Singh had also participated in RSS rallies.

The Congress spokesman pointed out that even the counsel for the commission had said on May 31 that prima facie evidence was available to link Dara Singh with the Bajrang Dal and RSS.

"Surely outfits like the Bajrang Dal will not maintain membership lists, given their record of objectionable activities. Further, Dara Singh could not have been present at RSS rallies only as a spectator given the record of his known activities," Sibal said.

He added that Prime Minister Vajpayee had called for a national debate on conversions when he should have looked within and searched his conscience. This was a crime against humanity.

"But if the BJP could provide safe passage to the enemy who left landmines behind to maim our soldiers, Vajpayee cannot be credited with such (power of) introspection," Sibal concluded.

Tell us what you think of this report