Raipur, Mar 18: Former Union Minister Vidya Charan Shukla today said he felt that the BJP, led by Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, was not communal.
Addressing reporters here for the first time after joining the party, he said, ''under Vajpayee's leadership, the BJP's policies are positive.'' Shukla, who threw in his lot with the BJP earlier this week after deserting the Rashtriya Jantantrik Dal which he himself floated following a split in the NCP, said he felt that Intra-party democracy was much stronger in the BJP than in the Congress. Shukla parried posers about his views on the Ayodhya imbroglio and other contentious issues being raised by the BJP, merely saying, ''it's not necessary that every member of a political party must agree or support all issues being raised by the organisation but they would air their views at party fora.'' ''I was active in national politics for more than five decades and am not interested in state politics,'' he added.
Bureau Report