India News and Travel Times Provides India-centric and other News and Features

Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) President Nitin Gadkari and Janata Dal (United) chief Sharad Yadav on Monday joined yoga guru Baba Ramdev at the Ramlila Maidan. Earlier addressing his supporters, Baba Ramdev said: "It has been decided that those responsible for corruption must be taught a lesson. The first call for uprising has gone out - Congress hatao, desh bachao (Remove the Congress, save the nation)." He further asked his supporters to march towards Parliament and has said he will protest outside Parliament now. "We will sit on dharna outside Parliament. We don't have any political agenda. Our agitation will continue to be non-violent," he said. We will have a peaceful march towards Parliament. We respect Parliament and honest parliamentarians. We are not terrorists. We never wanted to take this step to go and protest outside parliament. However, it is the government's apathy which has forced us," he added. He had earlier warned Prime Minister Manmohan Singh that if his demands for enactment of a strong Lokpal and measures to end corruption were not met, the country could face a "big revolution". "We have set deadline for the Prime Minister. He must act on our demands by today evening. If the Prime Minister doesn't take steps by the evening, we will announce a bigger revolution. The agitation will continue till our demands are met," he said. Baba Ramdev also took a jibe at the ruling Congress Party, saying the government has earned a bad image because of its own style of functioning. "We don't want to malign government. It has earned bad image because of itself. The Congress can't blame us for not giving notice. The Congress uses an honest Prime Minister as a shield," said Baba Ramdev.

Gadkari, Sharad Yadav join Ramdev at Ramlila Maidan