Preventing hoisting of national flag undemocratic: BJP

NEW DELHI - Senior Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Rajnath Singh Tuesday termed as “undemocratic” the government efforts to stop the party’s youth wing from hoisting the national flag in Srinagar on Republic Day, saying it was their fundamental right.

“It is the fundamental right given to the people of India to hoist the (national) flag and it is very unfortunate and undemocratic that the central government, along with the state government, is not allowing people to hoist the flag at Lal Chowk (in Srinagar),” Singh told reporters here.

Rajnath Singh has been sitting on a hunger strike at Rajghat here since Monday 8 p.m. to “protest against the government decision to prevent hoisting of national flag at Lal Chowk in Srinagar”.

Announcing that he will continue his hunger strike till Jan 26, Singh said: “I have already requested the prime minister and the president to allow people to hoist the tricolour.”

“Stopping countrymen from hoisting the (national) flag will send a wrong message in the country and will be a moral victory for separatist forces in the state,” he said.

BJP leaders had planned to address a public meeting in Jammu Tuesday to coincide with the arrival of the Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha’s Ekta Yatra (unity march) that plans to hoist the national flag in Srinagar’s Lal Chowk Jan 26 on the occasion of Republic Day.

BJP leaders Sushma Swaraj, Arun Jaitley and Ananth Kumar were not allowed to move out of Jammu airport after they landed there by a special flight Monday afternoon. They were later taken into custody by the Jammu and Kashmir police and sent to Punjab.

Union Home Minister P. Chidambaram Monday phoned Jaitley and asked him to return to Delhi, but the BJP leaders did not agree.

The prime minister had issued a statement Saturday saying that Republic Day was not an occasion to score political points, to embarrass state and local administrations or to promote divisive agendas.