Reaching out

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Reaching out

Friday, 08 July 2022 | Pioneer

Reaching out

The BJP is proactively working towards building strong bridges with the minorities

Only a few days after Prime Minister Narendra Modi exhorted his party men during the BJP’s national executive in Hyderabad to reach out to the deprived and downtrodden sections among the minorities, Smriti Irani has taken charge of the Ministry of Minority Affairs. On the face of it, the development was necessitated by the resignation from the Union Cabinet of Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi, who held the portfolio until his Rajya Sabha term ended on Thursday. However, it assumes significance in light of the fact that Smriti is considered a trusted part of the Prime Minister’s inner circle and is an able administrator, too, who has time and again proved her mettle in executing the Premier’s developmental blueprint in various sectors across the board. The move is also considered politically significant since Modi’s exhortation was lost on hardly anybody among his party cadres; what he was saying in effect was that the BJP workers should reach out to not only the weaker sections among Hindus but those among the minorities as well and help them reap the benefits of various Government schemes meant for the overall welfare of the entire society at large.

Incidentally, at another meeting of the party’s office bearers last year, too, Modi had made a similar suggestion. At that time, however, his focal point was the Christian community in Kerala to further strengthen the BJP’s base there. By all indications, the BJP is working to expand its base and, therefore, efforts are being made to reach out to the minority backward communities. It is with this hope that Union Home Minister Amit Shah had also proclaimed that the “next 30-40 years will be the era of our party”. Modi’s intervention at the national executive may have had something to do with the BJP’s performance in Uttar Pradesh, where it recently won the Lok Sabha bypolls in Rampur and Azamgarh, the two SP bastions with substantial Muslim population. In this regard, he rightly pointed out that there have been “several experiments” in Indian politics with social equations among Hindus, and attempts should be made to reach out to socially backward minorities, too; the Pasmanda Muslims have repeatedly lamented that despite their being numerical majority, only a tiny elite section among them remained in leadership positions and cornered the maximum political benefits.

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