Sonia under fire on seer issue

[Guest guest]

Sonia under fire on seer issue

The Asianage

April 23, 2005

 

New Delhi, April 23: UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi on Saturday was

targeted for

the arrest and "maltreatment" of Kanchi Shankaracharya at a seminar

on Threats

to National Integrity. Speaker after speaker at the seminar spoke up

on how

"the most audacious and blatant threat to India's integrity is the

foisting of

false murder cases on, and the rubbishing of, the reputation of the

Kanchi

Shankaracharyas." Mrs Gandhi was blamed for the manner of treatment

meted out

to the Kanchi Shankaracharya. Speakers said at the core of the

threats to

national integrity was the power-usurping role of the Congress

president, whose

proxy decision-making was undermining the constitutional governance

in the

country.

 

Equally at the receiving end was Tamil Nadu chief minister

Jayalalithaa, for

ordering the arrest of the Kanchi seers. The seminar, organised by

Janata Party

president Subramanian Swamy, was addressed by former Union defence

minister and

NDA convenor George Fernandes, former Union HRD minister Murli

Manohar Joshi

and Swadeshi Jagran Manch convenor S. Gurumurthy, besides former Goa

Governor

J.F.K Jacob and former Lok Sabha secretary-general Subhash C.

Khashyap.

 

Dr Swamy said, "The Supreme Court has already held that the cases

lack prima

facie basis on the evidence revealed by the police thus far.

Nevertheless, the

Tamil Nadu government, aided and abetted by the Central government,

has

continued with the atrocity committed on Hindu religion and the daily

defamation of the acharyas. Hence, this seminar calls upon all

patriotic forces

to set aside all differences as in 1975-77 and forge together a

political

instrument to challenge the forces behind the threat to our national

integrity."