Hon. Dr. Manmohan Singh, Prime Minister of India:

Your government first declared Ram never existed. Then you concede Ram existed but he destroyed the bridge he built. Now you say the bridge is not worthy of being a national memorial. Your government may hold weather-cock positions about Ram because political survival is more important for you than national integrity. But being so callous about Hindu religious sentiments, particularly when you go out of your way to appease Muslims with special developmental funds, is most un-secular and undemocratic. Moreover, you never intervened when development work for Amarnath pilgrims was nullified by rescinding land allotted to the shrine board. But here you seem determined to allow Ram Sethu to be destroyed in the name of development work. Even if your government does not recognize Ram, let it at least not destroy the sanctity of Ram’s legendary bridge built to uphold Dharma.

Yours in the name of Bharath Mata.

K.Venugopal

UPA's victory better for BJP in long run

Defeat of the UPA in today’s confidence vote will spell the end of the Congress. Karat’s tag of ‘sinking ship’ will work on Congressmen to abandon ship. The beneficiaries would be BJP and 3rd front. UPA’s victory would enable the party to consolidate its position in the next 6 months with lots of globalization policy announcements. The losers would be CPI(M) and there would be much infighting in the party. The 3rd front will also wither away, being seen as just a platform for Mayavati’s ambitions. BJP would be back to positioning itself as the only alternative.

Defeat of the UPA, therefore, would spell a period of great flux and would again end in a hung parliament – this time the major contenders the NDA and Third Front – with the UPA, particularly the Congress in a dismal third position. The NDA could well loose out to the Third Front in government formation. But UPA’s victory would bring the position back to square one and the battle would be between the UPA and NDA and the NDA having a greater chance of forming the next government. It would also cause CPI(M) to be singed in its internal fires.

I think, from the BJP’s long term interest, better UPA scrapes through the confidence vote.