By IANS,
Bhopal : Condemning what he terms as pseudo-secularism, the Bharatiya Janata Party’s prime ministerial candidate L.K. Advani here Thursday said that its pledge to build a grand Ram temple in Ayodhya was real secularism.
“We have taken everything on (our) agenda. The Somnath Yatra and Swarna Jayanti Yatra were part of our agenda and the Ram temple too has never been off our agenda,” Advani told a rally.
“I have been saying since 1997 that if given a chance, we will show what Surajya (good governance) is and we have shown it when we were in power for six years under the stewardship of Atal Behari Vajpayee. We have also shown it in states of Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh and in other states as well.”
Underlining that welfare of farmers and soldiers besides improving security of the nation would be on the party’s priority, he said: “There would be no shortage of money for these matters as we will bring back the country’s ‘black money’ stacked in Swiss and other banks abroad and make the 21st century the century of India if voted to power.”
The BJP leader, however, warned the workers not to be overconfident about the party’s victory. Advani said no power in the country could have stopped the party and its alliance from forming the central government in 2004 but “we faced reverses only because we were overconfident”.
He said the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance had put the country on the path of progress, but the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government halted every public-welfare scheme NDA had launched.
“During its five-year tenure, the BJP-led NDA did good work for the common man’s welfare. And that was the reason behind our overconfidence.”
Referring to the water crisis in several regions of the country, he added: “Steps will be initiated to implement the erstwhile NDA government’s ambitious river-linking Scheme.