As Pranab Mukherjee heads to Nagpur, BJP rubbishes rumours of daughter joining party

Vibha Sharma
Tribune News Service
New Delhi, June 6

Amid rumours his daughter Sharmistha Mukherjee will contest on a BJP ticket from West Bengal in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, all eyes are now on former president Pranab Mukherjee and what he has to say about the Sangh at the RSS function he has been invited to speak on Thursday.   

BJP sources vehemently rubbished talks of Sharmistha joining the saffron party and said no such political discussion has taken place between Mukherjee, a senior Congress leader, and either the leadership of the BJP or its ideological fountainhead—the Sangh.

Sharmistha also tweeted on Wednesday to rubbish the speculations, saying she would rather leave politics than the Congress. “In the mountains enjoying a beautiful sunset, & suddenly this news that I’m supposedly joining BJP hits like a torpedo! Can’t there be some peace & sanity in this world? I joined politics because I believe in @INCIndia Wud rather leave politics than leave Congress,” she said.

Terming all these speculations as “malicious and baseless”, BJP leaders said there were  “no strings attached” to the RSS invite to the former president, to which Opposition leaders have taken great offence.

 “No such political discussions have taken place. It is a normal invitation keeping in mind RSS’ tradition of calling eminent people to its annual event,” a senior leader here said, supporting the severe criticism launched against the Congress by RSS leader Manmohan Vaidya

Vaidya termed as  “undemocratic opposition to the exchange of ideas”, the “unseemly outrage amongst certain sections of the political class” on Mukherjee’s acceptance of the invitation to the concluding ceremony of the RSS’s Tritiya Varsh Training programme.

Former president Pranab Mukherjee is currently in Nagpur to attend an RSS event scheduled on Thursday.

Mukherjee’s acceptance of RSS invite has generated a lot of interest as well as controversy, with Congress leaders urging him not to attend the event in the "interest of secularism".

Senior Congress leader P Chidambaram has said that since Mukherjee has accepted the invitation, he should go and tell the RSS "what is wrong" in their ideology.

Ramesh Chennithala, a senior Congress leader from Kerala, last week sent a letter to Mukherjee, requesting him to refrain from attending the event.

Chennithala, also leader of the opposition in Kerala assembly, had said Mukherjee's decision had come as a "rude shock" to the secular minds of the country.

 "As a person who has served as the first citizen of our country and the greatest ambassador of secularism, I request you to reconsider your decision to attend the RSS meet on June 7,2018," said Chennithala in his letter.

West Bengal Congress chief Adhir Chowdhury and senior Congress leader V Hanumantha Rao too had urged Mukherjee not to attend the event.

 "I am really surprised to hear about the decision of Pranab Mukherjee to attend RSS's programme in Nagpur. Just like any other Congressman, I am really astonished to hear about it," said Chowdhury.

 "My question is does he (Mukherjee) think his previous comments against RSS were wrong ... We still remember how Pranab Mukherjee as a senior leader of the Congress had criticized RSS as a communal and a divisive organisation," he said.

Hanumantha Rao, the AICC Secretary and former Rajya Sabha member, said the former president should withdraw his decision" in the interest of secularism".

Mukherjee, who had held the highest post of President, should not attend the meeting of RSS as it is a "communal" organisation, Rao had added.

Veteran Congressman CK Jaffer Sharief also had sent a letter to Mukherjee, expressing surprise over the move and said he, like other secular people, was "stunned" to hear about his attending the RSS function. With PTI