Kejriwal's Lakshmi-Ganesh statement to lure voters in Gujarat?

In the run-up to the Assembly poll in Gujarat, AAP chief Arvind Kejriwal on Wednesday appealed to Prime Minister Narendra Modi to print images of Hindu deities Ganesh and Lakshmi on the Indian currency to “improve” India’s economy and for country’s “progress”.

This time Kejriwal is taking a rant from both right wing and left wing politician leaders. Left wings are claiming that Kejriwal’s party is rapidly turning into a radical hindutva party. Whereas right wing politicians are criticising him for hypocrisy as in the past his party was known for altogether different political spectrum. 

Ahead of the upcoming assembly elections in Gujarat, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal has played a new bet. Kejriwal has demanded that the picture of Lakshmi-Ganesh should be printed on the currency of India. This demand of Kejriwal has created a new political ruckus.

The AAP chief has been assertive about his Hindu identity and has also invoked Hindu symbols and icons in the past too.

Noted reporter “Himanshi Dahiya” at The Quint, taking a dig at AAP, has tweeted “AAP on its silence on Bilkis Bano case, Dalit conversions et al: We are here to do politics of schools, hospitals & jobs. BJP wants to win elections on religious & caste polarisation”

Also AAP: Let's introduce Laxmi and  Ganesh photos on Indian currency notes”

As has been observed by an editorial published in “The Hindu” ‘On the other hand, he has been silent on many issues related to Muslims”. The editorial has noted so many times when AAP leaders were silent on issues affecting the rights of muslim citizens. The three major instances it cited were : - 

In August 2021, when a crowd of people at Jantar Mantar — in the heart of the national capital — raised slogans about “killing Muslims”, while chanting “Jai Shree Ram”, the AAP supremo remained silent . 

In August this year, Mr. Kejriwal was also silent on the release of 11 people, who were convicted for raping 19-year-old pregnant Bilkis Bano in 2002 in Gujarat — a State where his party is fighting the Assembly election.   

Earlier this month, senior AAP leader Rajendra Pal Gautam had to resign as a Minister in the Delhi Cabinet, after he converted to Buddhism along with thousands of others and took 22 vows taken by B.R. Ambedkar in 1956, including the one on renouncing Hindu deities Ram, Vishnu and others.

Siddharth Varadarajan in his editorial has noted “Just as Kejriwal’s followers insist in seeing virtue in his mad idea, Modi’s bhakts desperately clutched at the fiction of the new Rs 2000 notes carrying embedded microchips which could communicate with satellites and reveal to the authorities any unauthorised horde that is not in a bank – even if buried 200 feet underground. The end result was that the economy’s growth prospects got buried, while corruption never ended”

“The BJP says Kejriwal’s proposal is a ploy to fool Hindus before the upcoming municipal elections in Delhi. They may be right. He is be a “poor carbon copy” but at least the BJP is tacitly admitting that the original Hindutva party uses Hinduism as a ploy at election time. And does a much better job at it.”