Former VP Hamid Ansari: BJP ideology seeks to submerge democratic values 

Former Vice-President Hamid Ansari on Wednesday said Bharatiya Janata Party’s success was "sectoral" and regional rather than at the national level. He said the saffron party’s ideology "seeks to submerge" the democratic values of diversity and inclusiveness.

Speaking at the launch of a book Rise of Saffron Power: Reflections on Indian Politics on October 3, Ansari said: "Saffron ideology seeks to submerge the democratic values of diversity and inclusiveness in an alternate paradigm of exclusion and homogenisation."

He said in the last four years, the BJP-led government had "failed" in its economic policies. "This is evident as grievances were being expressed by farmers, students and unemployed youth," he said.

Congratulating the author Mujibur Rahman, Ansari said this book would be an essential reading for anybody working on contemporary Indian politics.

CPI lawmaker D Raja said: "BJP coming to power is not change of government. It is the quality shift in Indian polity, which is emerging as the fascist regime.

"We are not only passing through economic or political crisis but we are witnessing a kind of ideological and philosophical crisis," said Raja.