Digvijaya Singh offers Congress land' for Ram temple

Bhopal: Veteran Congress leader Digvijaya Singh, who is seeking elections from Bhopal Lok Sabha constituency, considered impregnable fortress of BJP, on Saturday gave a fresh lease of life to a 36-year-old controversy by offering land ‘owned’ by his party for construction of Ram temple.

The septuagenarian leader announced to donate the “Congress land” for construction of Ram temple at Hamidia in Bhopal city after offering ‘puja’ in the shrine on the occasion of Ram Navami, a festival celebrating birthday of Lord Rama, on Saturday.

“I declare to offer land of Congress party for construction of Ram temple”, Mr Singh, who seemed busy shedding his anti-Hindu image with his temple runs and visits to Hindu seers in the past two weeks ahead of May 12 LS polls to Bhopal, told reporters.

Incidentally, Mr Singh ‘unwittingly’ revived a 36-year-old controversy over allotment of land for construction of District Con-gress Committee (DCC) building by the then Con-gress government headed by late Arjun Singh, with his announcement.

“It is the Congress which has prevented construction of Ram temple by creating dispute over a particular piece of land for the past three and half decades,” the BJP leader said.

Now, Mr Singh has resorted to stunts by declaring to offer the land for construction of the temple for electoral gains”, the BJP leader said.

“Allotment of land to DCC by the then Congress government in MP headed by late Arjun Singh had invited strong protests from the Ram temple trust, the caretaker of the shrine, in 1983-84. The trust had claimed ownership on the land and disputed the state government’s contention that the land allotted to DCC was government property”, BJP spokesman here Rajnish Agrawal said.