NEW DELHI: More than 26 lakh people from minority communities, including a large number of Muslims, have become members of the BJP during its nationwide membership drive. Nearly six lakh people from minority communities have taken memberships offline. So far, the party has managed to rope in more than 10 crore members.
Senior BJP leaders say the membership drive suggests minority communities are not averse to the party.
The membership drive takes places every six years. This time, the drive was kicked off by PM Narendra Modi on October 2 across the country, except four poll-bound states of Maharashtra, Jharkhand, Haryana and J&K. The second phase began on October 25.
The party’s Minority Morcha, which had earlier made thousands of ‘Modi-Mitras’ from Muslim and other communities, led the drive this time. Jamal Siddiqui, national president of the BJP Minority Morcha, told this newspaper on Tuesday that 26,82,092 people became members during the drive. “Among the new members, nearly 90% are Muslims, followed by Christians and other minority communities,” he said.
Siddiqui said 6,12,916 primary memberships were done through online from Uttar Pradesh, followed by 3,55,388 from Assam, 3,12,900 from Madhya Pradesh, 2,61,000 from Uttarakhand, 2,30,780 from Gujarat.
Other states, which made thousands of Muslims as members are Bihar with 1,82,850, followed by Rajasthan 1,87,018, Kerala 93,731, Karnataka 93,000, Delhi 82,800, Tripura 70,673, and Chhattisgarh with 64,428.
“We conducted the membership drive in minority-dominated areas via online and offline (on the spot) in 26 states to achieve the target,” he said.
“Over the years, we have managed to convince Muslims as well others about the BJP’s politics of devlopment. Now they are BJP’s primary members. They are entitled to take part in elections of party office-bearers,” he said, adding that a large number of scholars of Islamic studies, retired teachers, religious preachers and others have joined the party as primary members.