New Delhi: From the construction of new roads and toilets to the development of auditoriums and sports grounds, Uttarakhand Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami has announced dozens of new projects for Kedarnath in the last few months, putting the assembly constituency—where a bypoll will be held on 20 November—centre stage.
The by-election was necessitated by the death of Kedarnath MLA Shaila Rawat in July. Located in Rudraprayag district, the assembly segment is part of the Pauri Garhwal Lok Sabha constituency, currently held by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
Rawat won the seat on a BJP ticket in the 2022 assembly polls and had previously been elected to represent the seat in 2012 as a Congress MLA.
The seat is important to the BJP because it is home to the revered Kedarnath shrine. Along with Uttarakhand’s Badrinath, Yamunotri and Gangotri, Kedarnath forms part of one of the most important Hindu pilgrimages, the Char Dham Yatra. The hill state sees thousands of Hindu pilgrims as well as large numbers of tourists every year.
Apart from announcing several infrastructure projects, Dhami also announced regularisation of temporary employees of the Shri Badrinath Kedarnath Temple Committee (BKTC). “The chief minister has announced regularisation of temporary employees of BKTC under a one-time settlement,” said a senior Uttarakhand government official to ThePrint.
The BJP currently holds 46 of 70 seats in the state assembly and is pitted against the Congress. Though the Congress lost all five of the state’s Lok Sabha seats in the June elections, it tasted victory in July during the bypolls held in Badrinath and Haridwar district’s Manglaur.
One can also gauge the importance of the Kedarnath bypoll from the fact that Dhami had said he would do the work of the Kedarnath MLA till someone else was elected.
The Dhami-led BJP government is hoping to use this opportunity to present its policies and plans for development to maintain stability in the state. In a short span of time, the chief minister has announced a total of 39 projects for the constituency.
The development projects approved by the government also include the construction of a primary health centre in the Pansilla area of Maithana village and a Guptkashi-Masta-Kalimath road.
“Improvement and asphalting of the Andhergarhi-Dhar Toliyan motorway under the Kedarnath Vidhan Sabha constituency will be carried out. The Triyuginarayan-Toshi Garudachatti route has been given approval,” said the senior government official quoted above.
He further said that Rs 40 lakh has been sanctioned for the development of the Kedarnath-Rambara-Rakadhar-Chaumasi trek route, adding that “toilets will also be built on Rudraprayag Jawadi bypass at a cost of Rs 18 lakh”.
A second senior official told ThePrint that Dhami approved Rs 56.30 lakh for Kedarghati as relief for businessmen affected by the damage to the pedestrian and motor road from Linchauli to Sonprayag during heavy rains in the Kedarnath area on 31 July.
“As per Chief Minister Dhami’s instructions, an amount of Rs 9.08 crore has been sanctioned for the affected businessmen in the past,” he said.
A battle of prestige
The BJP has also put its entire focus on the seat given its back-to-back electoral losses in UP’s Faizabad Lok Sabha seat, which covers Ayodhya, and the Badrinath assembly seat in Uttarakhand.
It has raised issues such as “land jihad”, “love jihad” and “thook (spit) jihad”. In early October, Dhami spoke at length on the issues, in addition to religious conversions, saying that such activities would not be allowed in the “devbhoomi” (holy land) of Uttarakhand.
His statement on “thook jihad” was welcomed by the Akhil Bharatiya Akhara Parishad (ABAP), the country’s largest group of Hindu ascetics, with its president, Ravindra Puri Maharaj, calling for strict action against offenders during the Hindu pilgrimages Char Dham Yatra and Kumbh Mela.
The bypoll has become a battle of prestige, with the Congress taking on the BJP directly and accusing it of “inciting Hindu-Muslim tensions ahead of the Kedarnath election”. Former chief minister Harish Rawat alleged that fearing a loss, the BJP was resorting to divisive politics and using religion for votes.
On 2 October, the state BJP president Mahendra Bhatt, for instance, welcomed Dhami’s promise to bring stricter land laws in the state and said it was the party’s commitment to protecting the state’s original form and demography.
But not all announcements have been received positively. In July, the priests of the Kedarnath temple protested against the construction of a similar shrine in Burari, in the national capital. They said it ran contrary to religious customs and traditions. The Shankaracharya of Joshimath, Avimukteshwaranand Saraswati, had also criticised the initiative. Dhami laid the foundation stone for the temple last week.
The Congress, too, had criticised the BJP as well as the Uttarakhand government over its handling of the issue.
“When disaster struck Kedarnath, the CM didn’t remember Kedarnath, and now he is on an announcement spree because he is trying to wash away the sins of his own government. In the name of Hindu Sanatan Dharma, a lot of misconduct by the ruling party has taken place,” Uttarakhand Congress Garima Dasauni told ThePrint.
“The Kedarnath Dham which is very close to the PM’s heart was taken for granted when CM Dhami himself laid the foundation of a symbolic Kedarnath Dham temple in Delhi’s Burari.”
She also accused the BJP’s leadership of staying silent when 228 kg of gold was allegedly stolen from the inner chamber of the temple—an allegation raised by Avimukteshwaranand in July this year. “The controversy remains unanswered even today. Photos and videos are often going viral from the garbhagriha, which is prohibited, and BJP leaders are seen posting these pictures,” she added.
(Edited by Sanya Mathur)
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