After Kejriwal’s ‘Lakshmi-Ganesh on Currency’ Plea, BJP’s Nitish Rane Tweets Rs 200 Note With Shivaji Pic

After Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal made an appeal to the Centre to print images of Goddess Lakshmi and Lord Ganesha on new currency notes, Maharashtra BJP leader Nitish Rane on Wednesday suggested notes should also be printed with photo of Chattrapati Shivaji Maharaj.

Rane also tweeted a photo of a Rs 200 currency note with Shivaji’s photo and wrote, “Ye perfect hai ! (This is perfect!)”

Earlier in the day, Kejriwal address a press conference and appealed to Prime Minister Narendra Modi to consider including the pictures of Goddess Lakshmi and Lord Ganesha in currency notes as they would earn the blessings of the Hindu deities and strengthen the economy. Kejriwal further said if Indonesia can do it, so can India.

It seems that Kejriwal’s appeal clearly has less to do with the economy and more to do with appeasing to the Hindu voters, in an unabashed attempt to corner the ruling BJP on the latter’s core Hinduvta plank. Therefore, Kejriwal’s words have got under the skin of the BJP.

BJP’s Sambit Patra took pot-shots at Kejriwal and said that “there is a song in a Hindi film – ‘kya ho gaya dekhte dekhte’”. During the press conference, Patra also said, “Kashmiri Pandit ko dilli me naukri dene se inkaar karne waale Arvind Kejriwal, Kashmiri Pandit ke upar hasne wale Arvind Kejriwal, aaj achanak jo Hindu banne ki chesta kar rehein hain, ye U-turn ki parakasta hai.”

The BJP has attempted to paint Kejriwal as someone who suffered from the ‘imposter syndrome’ and was a ‘chunavi Hindu’.

Aam Aadmi Party (MP) Sanjay Singh defended Kejriwal and attacked the BJP, saying that the Centre is going to print currency notes with photo of Savarkar.