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Following protest by Dwarka seer over use of 'Har Har Modi' slogan for BJP prime ministerial nominee Narendra Modi, the later on Sunday requested his supporters to refrain from using the slogan in future.
Dwarka Peeth Shankarachayra Swaroopanand Saraswati has earlier raised objection to "Har Har Modi" slogan in favour of Modi and registered a strong protest with RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat asking him to stop such "vyakti puja" (eulogising of individual).
The Shankaracharya, who is considered close to Congress leaders like Digvijay Singh, was unhappy over the traditional chant "Har Har Mahadev" raised to hail Lord Shiva being "modified" into "Har Har Modi" to spruce up Modi's campaign who is contesting from Varanasi Lok Sabha seat in Uttar Pradesh. Modi is also contesting from Vadodara in his home state.
"Some enthusiastic supporters are using slogan "Har Har Modi…" I respect their enthusiasm but request not to use this slogan in the future," Modi said on his official Twitter account.
Earlier, Swaroopanand, after learning about the slogan favouring Modi, had called up Bhagwat on Saturday and asked him to put a stop such chanting, which was an insult to Lord Shiva. "I told him that converting 'Har har Mahadev' into 'Har Har Modi' must be stopped. Instead of worshipping god, it is an attempt to worship a particular human being and is against Hindu religion," he had told Bhagwat. The seer was also flooded with phone calls from devotees, who are deeply hurt by such slogan-chanting.
Bhagwat had told the seer that RSS was against man-worshiping.
He also claimed that such chanting could have been done out of over enthusiasm by some supporters, and it was not an intentional effort by BJP.
However, Swaroopanand remained unconvinced by the explanation given by Bhagwat.
