VIDEO: Rajasthan's CM Raje as Goddess Annapoorna?

May 30, 2007

Jaipur (Rajasthan), May 26, 2007: BJP leader Jaswant Singh's wife

Sheetal Kanwar has filed a police complaint against the publishers of

a poster that depicts Rajasthan Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje and

other senior leaders as Gods and Goddesses. Kanwar has claimed that

the poster hurts religious sentiments of Hindus.

The complaint has also been filed against the BJP leaders present at

the release of the poster last month.

It was the ultimate in Photoshop politics. Last month Jodhpur's BJP

MLA Suryakanta Vyas took sycophancy in Rajasthan to a new level with

a poster created by a temple priest depicting Rajasthan Chief

Minister Vasundhara Raje as Goddess Annapurna and her Cabinet

colleagues as courtiers.

The poster also depicts senior BJP leaders L K Advani, Rajnath Singh

and Atal Behari Vajpayee as Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva respectively.

" The Vidhan Sabha is like a royal court where the royal sits on the

throne and the courtiers sits at a lower level so I've shown Mother

Vasundhara holding court and the ministers as courtiers, " says the

priest, Hemant Bohra, in his defence.

And this isn't the first time for Vasundhara Raje to be projected as

a Goddess. In the last three years of BJP rule, there's been an

entire prayer book dedicated to her and one of her Cabinet colleagues

actually got away with worshipping her in his private temple.

There's a Friends of Vasundhara club, a Vasundhara Raga and hundred

of posters of the Chief Minister across the Pink City.

But, it's not just the Congress, people in Jaipur, too, have had

enough of all the fawning.

Says a resident of Jaipur, Ritesh, " This is sheer flattery. It's not

only regressive, but it also hurts our religious beliefs and we

expect our Chief Minister to act strongly in discouraging such feudal

acts. "

But for Raje devotees, it sure seems that flattery is the way to get

everywhere.

SOURCE: CNN-IBM

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