Former Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) president Pravin Togadia on Tuesday said the BJP should remove loudspeakers from mosques in states where it is in power. On the demand made by MNS chief Raj Thackeray to the Uddhav Thackeray government, he said that he did not take such a step when the Bharatiya Janata Party was running Maharashtra. Why are they suddenly making such a demand in the government of Maha Vikas Aghadi.
Togadia said that while attacking the BJP, you are protesting in Maharashtra but not removing loudspeakers in Madhya Pradesh and Gujarat. Remove loudspeakers first in states where BJP is in power. Togadia said that we had demanded removal of loudspeakers from the mosques of Maharashtra about ten years ago. For the last two years, they have been making this demand in Uttar Pradesh as well. But the government is not listening to them.
The former VHP president said that BJP is raising such demand only in those states where it is not in power. Its intention is to destabilize non-BJP governments. He demanded that the central government should implement the order of the Supreme Court regarding loudspeakers in the whole country. Then there will be no sound from anywhere. He said that such issues divert the attention of the governments. This also affects their work adversely. BJP is deliberately raising such issues so that people’s attention can be diverted away from issues like inflation and unemployment.
Praveen Togadia was once a strong leader of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad and was in the news due to his controversial statements and comments made about minorities. Many cases are also registered against him for controversial statements. Born in Ahmedabad, Togadia joined the RSS at the age of 10. He has been the International General Secretary of VHP. He has also been a cancer surgeon. But after Narendra Modi became the PM, his stature went down. In 2018, he was found unconscious in Shahibagh area of Ahmedabad. After that he was also forcibly expelled from the VHP.