Shivraj Singh Chouhan criticises attempts to `communalise` elections

Bhopal: In an apparent reference to SP leader Azam Khan`s `hate` speech dragging the Kargil conflict into the high-voltage Lok Sabha electioneering, Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan on Wednesday said he was appalled by the desperate attempts to communalise the polls.

"India needs growth, jobs, security, infrastructure and justice for all Indians," Chouhan said on micro-blogging site Twitter. "Our armed forces should be kept out of communal politics at any cost and added that any inimical attempt to do so should face prosecution," he tweeted without taking any names. The controversy-prone Khan, a minister in the Uttar Pradesh government, kicked up a row at an election rally in Ghaziabad on April 7 when he said it was "Muslim soldiers" who fought for India`s victory in the 1999 Kargil war against Pakistan. "Those who fought for victory in Kargil were not Hindu soldiers, in fact the ones who fought for our victory were Muslim soldiers," he had said in a speech laced with communal overtones. Meanwhile, the Election Commission today sought a detailed report from poll authorities in Uttar Pradesh on the controversial remarks made by Khan besides SP chief Mulayam Singh Yadav and RLD chief Ajit Singh during their campaign.