When the BJP held the SC/ST/OBC and slum dwellers ‘Swabhimani Samavesha’ at the government junior college grounds here on Sunday it marked the conservative right-wing outfit keeping pace with the times.
It was a “political compulsion”, a BJP leader quipped. The BJP paid its rivals in the same coin, he added.
The party projected its prime ministerial designate Narendra Modi and Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan as being from backward communities and that they had brought many Dalit and backward class leaders to the fore.
A chunk of leaders from these communities, including the state SC wing president A Narayanaswamy, vice president A R Krishnamurthy, leaders Govinda Karjol, Aravinda Limbavali, Kota Srinivasa Poojari and Raghunath Rao Malkpure spoke prominently on the occasion.
The leaders were continuously being termed as Dalit and backward class leaders, adding emphasis on these terms, to send a message to the audience. The leaders alleged that the Congress had snubbed the likes of Mallikarjuna Kharge and G Parameshwara when they were eyeing the chief minister’s post in the state.
BJP national general secretary H N Ananthakumar emphasised that Chouhan hailed from the most backward Kirar caste. “He will be arriving to address his ‘bandhus’ (relatives), and it’s you,” he said. Anantha Kumar quoted examples of Dalit and backward classes leaders like Sushilkumar Modi, Raghuvandas, Kariyamunda and Arjun Munda among others, who had emerged as leaders within the BJP.