BJP Minority Morcha holds national executive to woo Muslims

Hyderabad, Apr 5 (UNI) The two-day national executive of the Bharatiya Janata Party Minority Morcha began here today, with its leaders giving a call to the Morcha activists to get the party closer to minorities and pave the way for its return to power at the Centre under the leadership of BJP Prime Ministerial candidate L K Advani.

Inaugurating the conclave, being held for the first time in this historic city, former BJP president M Venkaiah Naidu said the party needed more leaders from the minority communities. ''Anybody wedded to the ideology of nationalism and having necessary qualities of leadership will have ample opportunities to rise in the party.'' Appealing to the activists not to have a self-defeatist belief that the BJP could never win the support of minority communities as propagated by its political opponents, he said many spoke against fielding Morcha president Shahnawaz Hussain in the Bhagalpur Lok Sabha by-election, saying that he would not win the votes of either the Hindus or Muslims. Mr Hussain proved them wrong by securing enough votes of both the communities.

Presiding over the executive, Mr Hussain said the ruling Congress had constituted the Sachar Committee on the eve of the Assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh. The report was only a reflection of the pitiable condition of Muslims in the country during the long rule of the Congress, he claimed.

The Sachar Committee had found that the government in power was the biggest encroacher of Wakf lands, but the government was not ready to return it to the Muslim community.

The BJP-led NDA would come back to power at the Centre to ensure that all Wakf lands under occupation were freed and given back to the Muslim community, he asserted.

Former Rajya Sabha Deputy Chairperson Najma Heptullah opined that the Sachar Committee had not said anything new about the backwardness of the members of the minority community. As a Rajya Sabha member from Rajasthan, she was concentrating on improving the condition of Madrasas and imparting modern education to students studying in them.

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