Subhechcha Ganguly 
“The Ram Temple issue had been stuck since Babur’s time, but just after the Supreme Court order, the prime minister did Bhumi Pujan in Ayodhya,” Amit Shah explained. Union Home Minister Amit Shah said on Thursday that the history of India’s freedom struggle was confined to one family, but Prime Minister Narendra Modi ended it by “immortalising” Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel. The Ram Temple issue had been dormant “since the time of Babur,” but the prime minister performed Bhumi Pujan in Ayodhya shortly after the Supreme Court’s order. Shah stated that Lord Ram will be in his grand temple by Ram Navami next year.
Soon after landing at the Bhalla College helipad here, Shah was met with protests from Congress workers at Parashuram Chowk over Rahul Gandhi’s removal as MP. Some of them presented the home minister with black flags and were detained by police.Speaking at the 2nd Sanyas Diksha Mahotsav at Yoga guru Ramdev’s Patanjali Yogpeeth here, Shah said the prime minister immortalised Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel by erecting the Statue of Unity in his memory at Kevadia in Gujarat.
“India’s freedom struggle was confined to one family,” Shah said, “but Prime Minister Modi put an end to it by immortalising Patel with the Statue of Unity.” He claimed that Modi has resurrected Hindu symbols, rebuilt Hindu pilgrimage sites such as the Kashi-Vishwanath and Somnath temples, and recovered idols stolen from India during the slave trade.To support his point, the Union minister cited the reconstruction projects undertaken in Kedarnath and Badrinath under Modi’s direction.Shah also credited Modi with bringing Yoga the international recognition it deserved by advocating for it at the United Nations.He described Ramdev as a yoga therapist, a swadeshi pioneer competing with international companies, a seer who fought black money, and an educationist who is fully committed to “Indianizing” education. Congratulating 100 new’sanyasis,’ including men and women, who were conferred with “sanyas diksha” by Patanjali on Thursday at a ceremony on the banks of the Ganga earlier in the day, Shah said he is pleased to see that Patanjali’s “army” of young sanyasis will provide new energy to ancient Indian knowledge.
Before beginning his speech, Shah performed a havan at Patanjali Yogpeeth. Earlier in the day, Shah praised the central government’s New Education Policy for emphasising mother tongue learning and universal education based on the teachings of Mahatma Gandhi and Dayanand Saraswati.In his address to the 113th convocation of the Gurukula Kangri here, Shah credited the university (so-called) with reviving vedic education in India and combining it with modern education.
