Digvijaya Singh praises Amit Shah for stay arrangements during his 2017 Narmada Parikrama

In rare praise for Home Minister Amit Shah, Congress veteran Digvijaya Singh on Thursday,  said that Shah had arranged for his safe passage and stay in Gujarat during his 2017 `Narmada Parikrama'. Pointing that his journey was during the Gujarat polls where Congress was its prime opponent, Digvijaya Singh said that Amit Shah has ensured that his yatra was done without issues, arranging for food and access to hilly areas. Singh was addressing an event in Bhopal for the launch of book 'Narmada Ke Pathik'.

Digvijaya Singh praises Amit Shah

"Once, we reached Gujarat at 10:30 pm. There was no way ahead through the forested area and no facility for an overnight stay. A forest officer arrived & you'll be surprised to know that he told me that Amit Shah had directed him to fully cooperate with us. Elections were going on in Gujarat, Digvijaya Singh is their biggest critic, but he (Amit Shah) ensured that there should not be any problem during our yatra," said Digvijaya Singh.

He added, "Till today I have not met Amit Shah. But I expressed my gratitude to him through proper channels". When he was passing through Bharuch region, RSS workers arranged the stay for his group at a Manjhi Samaj Dharamshala one day and the hall where they were put up had photos of RSS stalwarts Keshav Baliram Hedgewar and Madhavrao Sadashivrao Golwalkar on the walls, the Congress leader recounted. A leader of the BJP's youth wing Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha and three other BJP workers were part of his group, and they are now an inseparable part of his 'Narmada family", he said. Singh had started the over 3000 km-long journey which lasted six months from Barman Ghat in Narsinghpur district on September 30, 2017.

Digvijaya's jibes at RSS

Digvijaya Singh has often targeted the RSS with the saffron group's Saraswati Shishu Mandir schools his recent target. He had alleged that seeds of hatred were being sown in the minds of young kids at the RSS-backed schools and that the RSS does not represent Hinduism and was a misuse of religion for politics. Digvijaya Singh has repeatedly slammed the RSS, accusing them of sympathising with Mahatma Gandhi's assassin - Nathuram Godse.

Previously on Sept 10, Singh compared the RSS to the Taliban citing a purported similarity in their views on working women. The terrorist group's takeover of Afghanistan has raised fears that it will reinforce the laws which prevailed during its erstwhile regime from 1996 to 2001 that include barring women from attending school and working outside the home. To justify his comparison, he quoted RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat's 2013 speech in which he had said that 'till the time a wife follows the contract of marriage, the husband stays with her, if the wife violates the contract, he can disown her.

(With PTI Inputs)