‘Thamarai Sangamam,' the fifth State conference of the Bharatiya Janata Party, began here on Thursday with a call by the party's national president to develop it as an alternative force capable of coming to power in the place of major Dravidian parties in Tamil Nadu.
The party president, Nitin Gadkari, claimed that the BJP, with good governance and development on its agenda and nationalism as its philosophy, had the capacity to change the State's fate. He was confident that the party would gain in strength in Tamil Nadu after the conference and send representatives to Parliament and the State Assembly. BJP would make major gains in the State in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, he said.
Mr. Gadkari accused the United Progressive Alliance government of failing to stop the genocide of Tamils in Sri Lanka.
The Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam, a constituent of UPA, also did not do anything to protect the Tamils. The BJP wanted Sri Lanka to stop atrocities against the Tamils there and ensure that they lived with dignity.
Former party president M. Venkaiah Naidu said the time had come to tell the people that there should be a change in government. Mr. Naidu claimed that the country badly needed the BJP now. It was the only party that remained united and all others were fragmented. The Madurai conference, he said, would mark a new chapter in Tamil Nadu politics.
P. Muralidhar Rao, secretary, said the party's objective should be to organise the next conference in Chennai, while holding the reins of power in Fort St. George. If the BJP became powerful in Tamil Nadu, there would not be any challenge from divisive forces in the form of bomb threats and blasts. The BJP was the only party which was capable of protecting Tamil pride, culture and language.
The State president, Pon. Radhakrishnan, called upon the workers to take up the challenge of being an alternative to the two major Dravidian parties. He hoped that the conference would be a turning point in State politics.
Speakers from the State trained their guns at the DMK, though there were references to bus fare revision and poor power supply management of the ruling AIADMK. The main thrust of the attack was on DMK's failure to protect the interests of Tamils in Sri Lanka. The conference witnessed a huge gathering that is not normally seen for a non-Dravidian party in Madurai. Thousands of volunteers swarmed the venue with their families, walking a few kilometres, since morning.
Some of the main thoroughfares were sealed inside the city and on the peripheries to facilitate movement of VIP vehicles. This resulted in traffic hold-ups and the people were forced to walk some distance.
