Ramdas Athawale meets Nitish Kumar, day after pledging support to Buddhists on Mahabodhi row

Patna: Union minister Ramdas Athawale on Saturday met Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, and is understood to have taken up the issue of Buddhists being denied full control of the trust governing the Mahabodhi Temple Complex.

Athawale, who heads the Republican Party of India, met the JD(U) supremo at the latter’s official residence here, a day after having visited Bodh Gaya, where the Mahabodhi Temple Complex – a UNESCO World Heritage site – is situated.

The Dalit leader came out with a number of posts, in Marathi, on X, voicing support for the demand to scrap the Mahabodhi Temple Act, which stipulates that the trust shall have four members each from Hindu and Buddhist communities, besides the district magistrate of Gaya as the ex-officio chairperson.

The Minister of State for Social Justice and Empowerment had met Buddhist monks, who have been agitating on the issue and pledged support to their fight for "liberation of the Mahabodhi Temple trust".

The Mahabodhi Temple has been built on the site where Buddha was said to have attained ‘enlightenment’ about 2,500 years ago.

In one of his social media posts, Athawale had also announced that he will be meeting Nitish Kumar and the state governor over the issue.