Patna,(BiharTimes): In a bid to make inroads into the Extremely Backward Caste votebank the Bharatiya Janata Party president Rajnath Singh on Wednesday showered praise on Jan Nayak and former Bihar chief minister Karpoori Thakur.

He went on to demand Bharat Ratna not only for him, but also for the former NDA prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee. He did not stop there, but went on to equate the simplicity and humble origin of Karpoori Thakur with the party’s prime ministerial candidate, Narendra Modi.

Addressing BJP’s function to observe birth anniversary of Karpoori Thakur, the BJP president said that Narendra Modi also belongs to an Extremely Backward Caste and shares a similar poor background.
However, the BJP chief did not miss the opportunity to target the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leader and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal for indulging in political branding of simplicity, which, according to him, has become a fashion. Here again he said that Karpoori Thakur never indulged in political branding of his simplicity.

The former deputy chief minister Sushil Kumar Modi, leader of opposition in state Assembly Nand Kishore Yadav, state party chief, Mangal Pandey, former Union home secretary Raj Kumar Singh and others were present on the dais.

Earlier, like his party president, Sushil Modi also sought Bharat Ratna for Karpoori Thakur and quota in reservation for the EBCs.

The function witnessed leaders lashing out at the Nitish Kumar government in Bihar. They did not spare the Rashtriya Janata Dal and Congress too.

But by observing Karpoori Thakur’s birth anniversary the BJP plans to cut into the votebank of both the Janata Dal (United) and RJD. Incidentally, both Nitish Kumar and Lalu Prasad are considered as the disciple of Karpoori Thakur, while the Bharatiya Jan Sangh, the earlier version of the BJP, was accused of bringing down his government in 1979. Karpoori was the chief minister of Bihar between 1977 and 1979.

So like first home minister of India, Sardar Patel, and former Dalit CM of Bihar Bhola Paswan Shashtri the saffron party has once again appropriated the legacy of those belonging to the rival political camps.
The objective is just one: to muster support for Narendra Modi.