Upping the ante on the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) over the reservation issue and changes to the Constitution, Chief Minister A. Revanth Reddy asked the BJP to explain its stand on the formation of the Justice Venkatachalaiah Commission to review the Indian Constitution.

Amid political attack on him by the BJP, Mr. Revanth Reddy said that the Atal Bihari Vajpayee government issued a gazette on February 21, 2000, constituting the commission to recommend changes to the Constitution. “Can BJP disown it?” he asked at a press conference on Wednesday.

He said that Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Minister Amit Shah should explain the commission’s recommendations. BJP leaders, who are targeting the Congress, should explain why they failed to take action against the BJP Cabinet Ministers and even the then Lok Sabha Speaker when he spoke openly on ending reservation in the country, he said.

He added that when the VP Singh government adopted the recommendations made by the Mandal Commission for providing reservation to the Other Backward Classes (OBCs), RSS started a movement across the country. On the political front, BJP stalwart L.K. Advani also led a rath yatra to create a ‘Mandal vs Kamandal’ narrative against the VP Singh government, he alleged.

Mr. Reddy also referred to RSS ideologue Golwalkar and claimed that Mr. Golwalkar opposed reservations and a Hindu State without rights to the downtrodden. He said that RSS ideologue M.G. Vaidya in 2015 had openly argued against caste-based reservation in the country and said that these should be continued for SCs and STs for only 10 years.

On changes to the Constitution, Mr. Reddy said that a prominent BJP leader and Cabinet Minister in 2017, Anant Kumar Hegde, had sought changes to the Constitution and people like him were working towards that goal. Mr. Reddy further said that former Lok Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan too, expressed that reservation was hampering development in the country. “BJP’s ‘400 seat’ campaign is an indication of this thought process,” he said.

The Chief Minister said that the return of the Congress-led UPA government in 2004 had stopped the efforts made to change the Constitution and feared that if the BJP gets an absolute majority, it will go ahead to make dents in the Constitution. Rahul Gandhi’s idea of BC census is to assure the downtrodden that their interests would be protected.

Mr. Reddy also dispelled the claims of BJP leaders that Muslim reservations were given by snatching away quota from BCs. He said BC (E) category was created by the Congress government to provide poor and backward Muslims reservations and they were not religious.

Why are Narendra Modi and Amit Shah opposed to Muslim reservation when Muslim businessman from Kerala, Lulu Brothers, were allowed to run the biggest slaughterhouses in Gujarat and Uttar Pradesh, he asked and pointed out that this was pure hypocrisy of BJP leaders.

The CM also questioned the intention behind complaining to Delhi police on the alleged ‘doctored’ video of Mr. Shah. Delhi Police works directly under the Central government, he said.