August 23, 2016
New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi today told senior leaders of his party, the BJP, that they must focus on the message and agenda of nationalism which he said was a key factor in his record setting victory in the general elections two years ago.
August 23, 2016
New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi today told senior leaders of his party, the BJP, that they must focus on the message and agenda of nationalism which he said was a key factor in his record setting victory in the general elections two years ago.
Mr Modi also told the BJP's core group that the party must combat the perception and allegations of it failing to stand for and protect the weaker sections of society.
"80 per cent of party workers come from the SC/ST (Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes) and OBC (Other Backward Classes) category. Don't let the misinformation succeed," the PM told his team.
In recent months, a list of atrocities against Dalits has been leveraged by the opposition to claim that the BJP has failed in protecting the vulnerable caste's most basic rights.
Early in July, four young Dalit men were stripped, tied to a car and thrashed, in the village of Una in Gujarat, which is governed by the BJP. The victims had been wrongly accused of cow slaughter by cow vigilantes. A few weeks ago, the PM warned that violence by cow protection squads would not be tolerated.
In January, a young Dalit scholar named Rohith Vemula hanged himself at his university in Hyderabad after alleging that he had been persecuted relentlessly by officials on account of his caste.
Courtesy: NDTV
