Nadia: Union home minister Amit Shah in a conversation with BJP leader Suvendu Adhikari during the 152nd birth anniversary celebrations of Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati Thakur Ji in Nadia, West Bengal. (PTI Photo)
Mayapur/Kolkata: Politics surrounding SIR took a back seat to spiritual reflection as home minister Amit Shah travelled Wednesday to Mayapur in Bengal’s Nadia, the cradle of Bhakti movement, for a pre-poll Matua outreach focused on highlighting the community’s contribution towards what he called “unification of Hindu society”.Shah lavished praise on social reformers like Matua Mahasangha founder Harichand Thakur and his son Guruchand Thakur and the Vaishnavite saint Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati, whom he described as the bridge between the Bhakti movement and “modernity”. “Harichand and Guruchand Thakur, and Matua society as a whole, took the idea of social welfare forward,” he told a gathering, highlighting their campaign against untouchability and promotion of education and gender equality within the community.Shah, a guest at the 152nd birth anniversary of Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati, said he was in Mayapur not as the home minister but as a devotee of the founder of 64 Gaudiya maths (monasteries) in India and abroad.Conveying PM Modi’s “Hare Krishna” greeting to those attending the event, Shah said, “Whenever foreign guests visit Modiji, he presents them a copy of the Bhagavad Gita. The epicentre of Bhakti movement was in Nadia and will spread in the days to come. I am sure we will be able to send the message of Viksit Bharat and Sanatan (dharma) to the world.”Sources said Shah’s visit was crucial to BJP’s relationship with Matua Mahasangha, an influential community in large parts of southern WB, ahead of polls later this year. But party functionaries in Bengal insisted that the HM didn’t want politics to creep into his message of solidarity with the community.
