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Stop supporting RSS, Mayawati tells BJP

Bahujan Samaj Party vice-president and former Uttar Pradesh chief minister Mayawati on Monday demanded that the Central and UP governments stop the "blind support" provided to the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, as it did not have a clean history of communal harmony and amity.

Addressing a press conference in Lucknow, she deplored Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee's statement that the RSS was a social organisation.

The RSS was a body which had political aims and objective and held command over the BJP, she said.

She described as ''dangerous'' the move of the Gujarat government to lift the ban on its employees that stopped them from attending RSS functions.

Claiming that a similar move was being contemplated by the Ram Prakash Gupta government, Mayawati said that it would be suicidal for UP as the state was communally very sensitive.

The Azamgarah district was still burning in the fires of communal hatred and the ''RSS was hell-bent on creating trouble in Varanasi on the pretext of opposing shooting of Deepa Mehta's film Water, Mayawati said.

Referring to smuggling and other ''illegal'' activities on the Indo-Nepal border and the government's subsequent ''panicky'' reaction against such, the BSP leader said she had during her tenure created police ranges for the purpose. But these have not been strengthened. The situation would not have worsened if care had been taken to maintain the police administration in that area, she said.

''It is nothing but the all-round failures of the Central government which is resulting in social unrest and deterioration of the law and order situation all over the country," she claimed.

Mayawati said that shifting the blame on to "foreign conspiracy" was another manifestation of the failure of the Centre.

She said it was ''very unfortunate'' that the Vajpayee government did not heed the staunch all-round opposition to the constitution of a commission to review the Constitution, but went ahead with the programme to ''fulfill its hidden agenda''.

''It was more unfortunate that the Central government was not taking people into confidence about the terms and reference of the proposed commission," she said, adding that the BSP reserved its right to protest against the Commission. Its line of protest would be announced when the commission's terms and reference were formally made public, she said.

Asked about the by-election in Uttar Pradesh, the BSP leader said any win would be a gain to the party as it had nothing to lose.

Mayawati would be touring all the eight constituencies from Tuesday till the completion of campaigning on February 15, she said.

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