The ruling Congress government in Himachal on Tuesday staged a protest in Dharamsala over the alleged irregularities in donations collected for the Ram Temple in Ayodhya, demanding a high-level and impartial investigation into the matter.
The opposition BJP hit back at the Congress, accusing the ruling party of attempting to divert public attention from governance failures.
The protest was led by Rajya Sabha MP and Kangra District Congress President Anurag Sharma. Party leaders and workers marched through the hill town. The protest started from Dharamsala Post Office Chowk, where party workers gathered carrying placards and banners before taking out a rally to the Hanuman Temple, raising slogans against the BJP-led Union Government and seeking action against those found responsible.
The demonstration witnessed the participation of senior Congress leaders, office-bearers and party workers from across Kangra district, including Rural Development and Panchayati Raj Minister Yadvinder Goma, MLAs Ashish Butail, Sanjay Rattan, Kewal Singh Pathania and Kishori Lal, besides former MP Viplove Thakur, chairpersons and vice-chairpersons of various boards and corporations.
Addressing the gathering and demanding an impartial and high-level investigation into the alleged scam, Anurag Sharma alleged that the alleged irregularities in Ram Temple donations were linked to the faith of millions of devotees across the country and therefore required complete transparency.
After the rally, Congress workers offered prayers at the Hanuman Temple and collectively recited the Hanuman Chalisa as a mark of protest. Party leaders warned that if their demands were not addressed, they would continue their agitation.
Meanwhile, senior BJP leader and former minister Bikram Singh Thakur said that the Congress was trying to exploit the faith of millions of devotees for political gains and that Chief Minister Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu was invoking Lord Ram to conceal his government's failures.
He alleged that Sukhu and the Congress government were using the name of Lord Ram to distract people from the failure to fulfil the party's ten poll guarantees, the state's deteriorating financial condition, mounting debt and administrative shortcomings.
He said that the chief minister should release a white paper on the state's actual financial position instead of making statements on the Ram Temple issue.
Thakur further said that the Congress had no moral authority to question Lord Ram or the Ram Temple, alleging that the party had opposed the Ram Janmabhoomi movement for years, created hurdles in the judicial process and even questioned the existence of Lord Ram.
He also rejected the Congress' allegations of corruption, saying the party should first answer questions about several scams that surfaced during its rule, including the 2G spectrum, coal allocation, Commonwealth Games, Bofors, AgustaWestland, Adarsh Housing Society, National Herald and other cases.