Chief Minister Siddaramaiah on Tuesday denied any plans from the government to sponsor devotees to Ayodhya even as the BJP is rolling out mega plans to send them in large numbers to the holy site in Uttar Pradesh.
“Don’t we have our own Ram Mandirs in Karnataka? Aren’t the temples in our own villages those of Lord Rama, Sita, Lakshmana and Anjaneya?” the CM retorted when the media queried if the government had any plans to send people from the state for a visit to Ayodhya. His comments came in response to a question about BJP’s target to send three crore people to Ayodhya over the next three months.
The BJP was indulging in politics over Rama, Siddaramaiah said, and added that the Congress worshipped the Rama that Mahatma Gandhi adored, not the BJP version of Rama.The BJP Karnataka unit has targeted to send more than 35,000 persons from all 224 assembly constituencies in the state to Ayodhya from January 31 to March 25. The trip will be for six days. The teams will include BJP workers and interested members of the public.
BJP state president BY Vijayendra said 25 special trains have been arranged for the purpose. The participants will get an ID card with a QR code.
The teams will leave in batches and one team will leave every second day.The party has fixed a fee of Rs 3000 per head. In some constituencies, however, local leaders are collecting below what the party has fixed as they will bear part of the cost. President of one mandal in Bengaluru, said they are collecting only Rs 1000 as a token payment. “We will bear the rest of the expenditure to be incurred on food, transportation and accommodation,” he said.