The Lucknow bench of Allahabad high court on Monday granted reprieve to arrested Vishwa Hindu Parishad leaders as the ruling Samajwadi Party prosecutors chose to soft peddle on them.
The twin towns of Ayodhya and Faizabad were on the edge on Saturday as tension mounted on the eve of VHP's yatra with the UP government cracking down on the saffron outfit arresting some of its leaders and over 350 activists.
The bandh call was given after two youths were stabbed, one fatally, near Mangaluru.
A day after the Uttar Pradesh government banned its proposed 'Sankalp Diwas' rally, the Vishwa Hindu Parishad on Tuesday vowed to go ahead with its programme even as the district administration said it was determined to thwart any such plan.
The VHP leadership notes that 'ghar wapsi' wasn't something started after the Modi govt took over. Archis Mohan reports
The charges under the UAPA have been imposed against Khan, the MLA from Ferozpur Jhirka, in a case registered at Nagina police station in Nuh.
The British government has said it does not consider the right-wing Hindu groups VHP, RSS and Bajrang Dal as "terrorist" organisations, in remarks which may have political connotation.
The Vishwa Hindu Parishad was on Monday refused permission by the Uttar Pradesh government to organise a yatra from Ayodhya to push for the construction of a Ram Temple at the disputed site, just days after it asked Samajwadi Party chief Mulayam Singh Yadav to work as a bridge between Hindus and Muslims on the issue.
Claiming there was nothing religious about Vishwa Hindu Parishad's 84 Kosi Yatra, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav today described it as a "political drama" which his government had not allowed to be staged.
At least 600 pilgrims traveling to the Amarnath shrine, led by Vishwa Hindu Parishad workers, on Sunday courted arrest after they were prevented from proceeding towards the hill shrine by the state administration. The date of the yatra was fixed on June 25 by the Shri Amarnath Shrine Board. But the pilgrims tried to start the yatra from Sunday, defying the prohibitory orders clamped to deter them.
The Uttar Pradesh police on Thursday arrested around 340 people, including former Bharatiya Janata Party Member of Legislative Assembly Lalu Singh, and put 42 others under house arrest on the eve of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad's 'Sankalp Diwas' rally in Ayodhya, which has been banned by the state government.
Nine people including three women were killed and 33 injured as a bus carrying pilgrims from Uttar Pradesh and Delhi plunged into a deep gorge after an ambush by terrorists in Jammu and Kashmir's Reasi district on Sunday evening, police said, as political leaders cutting across party lines strongly condemn the dastardly attack.
The Baharatiya Janata Party condemned Uttar Pradesh government's crackdown against VHP yatra from Ayodhya and accused it of playing vote bank politics while Samjwadi Party said it won't let the state "become another Gujarat" or a repeat of Dec 6, 1992, when the Babri mosque was demolished.
Two officers, including a deputy commissioner of police, were on Friday removed from field posting within 24 hours of a lathi-charge on Bajrang Dal activists staging an anti-drug mafia protest at a busy intersection in Indore.
'Shankaracharyas look at Prime Minister Narendra Modi and BJP through a political prism. This temple is not built on politics but on religion. Ram is our God'
It then went on to ask whether a lion could be named after Swami Vivekananda or Ramakrishna Paramahansa.
After clamping down on its yatra on the Ayodhya issue, the Uttar Pradesh government on Monday banned Vishwa Hindu Parishad's proposed 'Sankalp Diwas' stir on October 18 to press for a parliamentary legislation on building Ram temple, fearing a communal flare-up.
In the Marxists-ruled Kerala, the Vishwa Hindu Parishad Kerala chapter has launched a helpline offering assistance to "Hindus in distress". Named Shivaji Hindu Helpline, the service particularly offers "help for Hindu girls who are being lured into what they call the trap of "love-jihad".
The VHP will put up boards in various places all over the country declaring India a Hindu Rashtra.
Undeterred by the ban imposed by the Akhilesh Yadav-led Samajwadi Party government in Uttar Pradesh, the Vishwa Hindu Parishad on Friday said that it will go ahead with its proposed 'Sankalp Diwas' to take a resolve to launch an agitation for rebuilding the Ram temple in Ayodhya.
Praveen Togadia has said that it metes out injustice.
With Vishwa Hindu Parishad adamant in going ahead with its planned yatra from Ayodhya from Sunday, the Faizabad district administration on Friday issued arrest warrants against its 70 leaders amid heavy deployment of police force in the twin towns.
The Centre has rushed additional security forces to Ayodhya to prevent the much hyped yatra that is being planned by the Vishwa Hindu Parishad in spite of a ban on it by the Uttar Pradesh government.
The Vishwa Hindu Parishad had no qualms seeking a state government car for its general secretary Praveen Togadia to tour Rajasthan.
As a precautionary measure, the Nuh district administration has already ordered the closure of educational institutions and banks on Monday, suspended mobile Internet and bulk SMS services, and imposed prohibitory orders in the communally-sensitive district.
Stepping up pressure for the construction of Ram Temple in Ayodhya, the Vishwa Hindu Parishad has said the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party at the Centre cannot afford to fail its electors on the "core issue" and must deliver on it.
Jammu and Kashmir unit of Vishwa Hindu Parishad termed the invite by Pakistan High Commissioner Abdul Basit to Kashmiri separatists as "strange and ironical," saying the neighbouring country is playing with the sovereignty of India.
Nearly 450 people were picked up at the Ayodhya and Faizabad railway stations, 400 in Varanasi and 350 in Allahabad as authorites hinted at seeking the army's help if the situation so warranted.
Sensing the Vishwa Hindu Parishad's attempts to rekindle Ayodhya sentiments, the Akhilesh Yadav-led government in Uttar Pradesh has banned a meeting to mark the 25th death anniversary of brothers, Ram and Sharad Kothari, who fell to police bullets while performing the symbolic kar sewa on November 2, 1990 -- two years before the Babri Masjid was brought down.
"I am being targeted for a decade-old case, there is an attempt to suppress my voice. Rajasthan Police team came to arrest me. Someone told me plan was being made to kill me in an encounter," the VHP president claimed.
If the government plan goes through, the trustees will have no say in temple affairs.
At a function in Salem on Friday, Karunanidhi had stated that Lord Ram was an imaginary character.
Activists of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad and the Bajrang Dal staged a demonstration in New Delhi on Saturday against the ban on their leader Praveen Togadia's visit to Orissa's Kandhamal district. The Orissa government has imposed a ban on VHP leader Togadia from entering the communally sensitive Kandhamal district."The state government didn't stop foreign missionaries from going to tribal areas of Kandhamal and other parts of Orissa," said a VHP leader.
The Maharashtra police on Thursday registered a case against Vishwa Hindu Parishad leader Praveen Togadia for making a hate speech in the Nanded district of the state last week.
Mobs killed a cleric in a late night attack on a mosque, torched an eatery and vandalised shops as communal violence that began in Haryana's Nuh spilled over into Gurugram, taking the death toll to five, the police said on Tuesday.
Bharatiya Janata Party Member of Parliament Yogi Adityanath and 24 others accompanying him to the Vishwa Hindu Parishad's 'Sankalap Diwas' rally in Ayodhya were on Friday arrested at the railway station in Gonda, Uttar Pradesh, as a preventive measure, police said.
The Shri Ram Janmabhoomi Teerth Kshetra Trust has sent invitations to 7,000 people, including 3,000 VVIPs, for the consecration.
Sonal Shah, the first Indian-American to be inducted in United States President-elect Barack Obama's transition team, has formally renounced her affiliation with the Vishwa Hindu Parishad, which has been accused of fomenting violence against Muslims and Christians in India.Shah, former member of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad, has said if she could have anticipated the outfit's role in the 2002 communal violence in Gujarat, she would have never associated with its US branch.
The VHP is trying to gain political mileage through its October 17 programme in Ayodhya, Gyan Das, mahant of the Hanumangarhi Temple, said.
After Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh chief Mohan Bhagwat's remarks that rapes were prevalent in India and not in Bharat, the Vishwa Hindu Parishad blamed the 'western model' of lifestyle for growing incidents of sexual assault on women including rape, saying cities were losing the values.
© 2026 Rediff.com - Investor Information - Advertise with us - Disclaimer - Privacy Policy - Sitemap - Feedback - About us - Terms of use - Grievances