By PTI
NEW DELHI: The BJP wants to fight and win polls everywhere on basis of its ideology, programmes, leadership’s popularity and performance of the government, and not by unleashing violence against rivals, Home Minister Amit Shah said on Wednesday.
Replying to the debate over the Delhi Municipal Corporation (Amendment) Bill, 2022, in Lok Sabha, Shah said the BJP wants to form government everywhere and that is why it fights polls.
“Why did you go to Goa, why are you going to Tripura.
You have the right to go, I don’t say don’t go, every party must go with their ideology, programmes, performance to all places, this is the beauty of democracy,” Shah said in an apparent response to remarks made by TMC MP Saugata Roy.
Only those who are afraid of losing power can have an objection to it, not the proponents of democracy, he added.
“I want to say that on the basis of our programmes, ideology, popularity of leadership and the performance of our government, we want to fight polls and win everywhere. But we don’t want to grab power by killing workers of rival parties, carrying out series of murders, by raping wives and daughters of (rival) party workers. This is not our culture,” Shah said in an apparent reference to West Bengal and the ruling TMC there.
He also took a swipe at the Congress and the TMC, saying they are parties run for families and don’t hold internal polls for years.
“First hold polls in your party, then talk about country,” Shah said.
Shah on Wednesday said assembly elections in Jammu and Kashmir will be held once the delimitation exercise is over and after consultation with political parties.
“We have no interest in keeping Jammu and Kashmir under President’s Rule,” Shah said in Lok Sabha while responding to concerns raised by members on Kashmir during the discussion on the Delhi Municipal Corporation (Amendment) Bill.
Shah said that he had made it clear that first panchayat elections will be held in Jammu and Kashmir, then this would be followed by the delimitation exercise, after which assembly elections will be held, and then J-K’s statehood will be restored.
“Panchayat elections have been held, without any violence. Zilla panchayat elections are over. Delimitation is on the verge of completion. I would like to say this once again, that once delimitation is completed we will hold elections after consultation with political parties,” Shah said.
During the discussion on the Delhi Municipal Corporation (Amendment) Bill, opposition members had accused the government of delaying the assembly elections in Jammu and Kashmir.
Jammu and Kashmir has been under President’s Rule since June 2018, when the BJP walked out of the coalition government with the PDP which was led by Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti.
The Modi government had bifurcated the state into union territories of Jammu and Kashmir, and Ladakh in August 2019.
Jammu and Kashmir, which is now a Union Territory with a legislative assembly, is under President’s Rule under the J&K Reorganisation Act.
