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BJP owns up responsibility for not preventing Godhra
December 05, 2002 16:20 IST
The Bharatiya Janata Party on Thursday owned up responsibility for failing to prevent the Godhra carnage and the terrorist attack on the Akshardham temple.
The party, however, charged the Congress with "sowing and growing seeds of divisive forces".
"We take responsibility for whatever happened at Godhra and Akshardham. We are not running away from it. There is nothing to hide, but it takes time to rectify mistakes committed over the past 50 years," party president Venkaiah Naidu told reporters in response to a question on why these incidents took place during the BJP rule.
Naidu, who is in Ahmedabad to launch the second phase of the party's campaign for the December 12 election, also defended the party raising the Godhra issue.
"If the Congress, the Communists, and other secularists can rake up every year the matter of demolition of the Babri structure even years after the incident... the opposition has objection to our raising an issue in the election, which happened eight months back, but what is the rationale behind their observing December six, in which no one died, every year except to take political advantage? This is a classic case of double standards," he said.
"One can never forgive and forget Godhra. We don't need any permission from anyone to raise the issue," he said adding it was being raised only to "remind people of what happened".
Naidu said the Congress has not bothered to even give a clarification with regard to the allegation of its involvement in the Godhra carnage.
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