The Shiv Sena on Tuesday raked up again the Ayodhya issue to corner the Bharatiya Janata Party and said the temple issue had been reduced to a mere poll promise. In an editorial, published in their mouthpiece Saamana, the Shiv Sena warned that the government at the Centre would be thrown out of power in the next elections if it failed to build the temple.
The Shiv Sena asked the government led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi to seriously take up the matter. The party is also an ally of the ruling National Democratic Alliance.
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“When the BJP came to power in both Centre and Uttar Pradesh, we believed that the Ram temple would be constructed in Ayodhya. But nothing happened so far. Now, neither the prime minister nor the Hindutva people are saying anything about construction of the temple. The temple issue has been reduced to only a poll promise and, therefore, has become a topic for ridiculing Hindutva,” read the editorial.
Earlier, senior Shiv Sena leader Sanjay Raut had said that party president Uddhav Thackeray would visit Ayodhya after Diwali this year. His comment came after Ram Janmabhoomi Trust chief Janmejay Sharanji Maharaj met Thackeray at the party's headquarters in Mumbai.
Raut had said Thackeray would announce the date of his visit to Ayodhya at the party's annual Dussehra rally to be held in Mumbai on October 19.
Meanwhile, a newly-constituted three-judge bench of the Supreme Court will begin hearing of a civil suit on the Ayodhya land dispute on October 29.
