Rajkot: BJP leader LK Advani on Thusday embarked on his sixth yatra invoking Lord Ram and appealing to Muslims to abandon their claim over the disputed site in Ayodhya.
The launch of the 6,000 km long Bharat Suraksha Yatra has started on Ram Navami day in the presence of Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi, Chief Ministers of other party-ruled states and senior BJP leaders.
But the post-Jinnah Advani, who has expressed a keenness to change the party's hardliner anti-minorities image, was far from aggressive.
Even the BJP's historic 1989 Palampur resolution endorsing the Ram Janambhoomi movement was not anti-Muslim, he asserted before the gathering which included Muslims both on the dais and the audience.
He also expressed concern over "Congressisation" of BJP and factionalism and corruption in the party and counselled the partymen to "tread carefully."
Appealing to the Muslims to respect Hindu sentiments and facilitate the construction of the Ram temple at the disputed site, Advani said the "minority appeasement" policies of successive Congress Governments, which began from the Shah Bano case, has only boosted the party's strength but was "neither in the interests of the Muslims or the country".
If both the communities come together for the construction of the Ram temple, it would bring about an unprecedented harmony and goodwill in the society, the former deputy prime minister said.
Interestingly, undertaking his first major political campaign after his controversial Pakistan visit last year, the veteran BJP leader sought to avoid any criticism of the neighbouring country on the issue of terrorism but focused on Bangladesh over the arrest of its alleged nationals in the Varanasi bomb blast case.
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