Under relentless attacks from the BJP over inclusion of banning Bajrang Dal (BD) in its manifesto for the Karnataka Assembly polls, Congress has got support of Samajwadi Party (SP) president Akhilesh Yadav.
Akhilesh said that the organisations, which spread hatred and disrupt communal harmony, must be banned. "There is no place for such organisations (BD) in the country," he said while speaking to reporters without naming the organisation.
The SP president also said that the then Home Minister Vallabhbhai Patel had banned the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS).
Congress has, in its manifesto, said that it will ban BD and the Popular Front of India (PFI) if it came to power in Karnataka after the Assembly polls. Prime minister Narendra Modi and Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath as well as many other senior BJP leaders have been attacking the Congress on the issue and have sought to dub the grand old party 'anti-Hindu'.
BD workers had tried to lay siege to Congress party's office in Jalaun district, about 200 km from here, a few days back in protest against the party prompting the police to intervene and disperse them.
The saffron party has sought to link the issue with the Hindu god Lord Hanuman, who was also popularly called 'Bajrang Bali'.
Although the Congress leaders have sought to stress that BD and Bajrang Bali were not the same and even declared that it will get scores of Hanuman temples built in Karnataka, the BJP has been trying to turn it into a major issue in the elections.
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