Azad, who represents Bardhaman-Durgapur in the Lok Sabha, said on Wednesday that his refusal stemmed from the account of Sita being sent away despite undergoing an agni pariksha, or trial by fire. He invoked his connection with Mithila, traditionally regarded as Sita’s birthplace, to explain why the episode troubled him.
“I will never go there, because Lord Ram abandoned his wife even after she had passed the agni pariksha,” Azad said when asked about Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav’s proposed visit to the shrine.
Azad described Sita as a mother figure for people from Mithila and questioned how he could explain her treatment to children. He also rejected the suggestion that refusing to visit Ayodhya amounted to rejecting Hinduism, pointing to his worship of Goddess Kali and visits to other temples.
BJP spokesperson Pradeep Bhandari accused Azad and the opposition INDIA alliance of insulting Hindu traditions for electoral advantage. In a social media response, he characterised the remarks as vote-bank politics and criticised opposition leaders, including Congress leader Rahul Gandhi and Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee.
BJP MP Sudhanshu Trivedi also questioned what he portrayed as the opposition’s selective criticism of Hindu beliefs, arguing that its leaders were less willing to scrutinise practices associated with other religious communities. Those assertions reflected the BJP’s political position rather than any established consensus about the opposition’s views.
The two disputes involve different opposition parties and positions. Azad has expressly ruled out visiting the temple, whereas Yadav has announced an intention to worship there. The BJP has nevertheless used both developments to question the opposition alliance’s approach to Hindu religious sentiment. Neither politician’s statements establish a common alliance policy on temple visits, and individual expressions of faith remain distinct from formal party positions.
The exchange coincided with a separate confrontation over Yadav’s announcement that he intends to visit the Ayodhya temple with his family on December 12. The BJP has challenged the timing of the trip, while Yadav has insisted that religious worship should not be treated as the preserve of any political party.
“God belongs to everyone,” Yadav said on Wednesday, adding that different religions follow different paths to worship. He said he also planned to visit Kedareshwar and religious sites in Mathura and Vrindavan, and had visited places of worship before.
Uttar Pradesh BJP president Pankaj Chaudhary urged Yadav to visit Ayodhya on December 6 instead and apologise over the police firing on kar sevaks during the government headed by his father, Mulayam Singh Yadav, in 1990. December 6 marks the anniversary of the demolition of the Babri Masjid in 1992.
Chaudhary alleged that Yadav’s planned pilgrimage was politically motivated. His demand linked the forthcoming visit to an episode that remains contentious in Uttar Pradesh politics, although the events of 1990 occurred under a different chief minister and decades before Yadav himself assumed that office.
Yadav responded by questioning why the BJP was concerned about his religious visits. He recast the Samajwadi Party’s PDA slogan, normally referring to backward classes, Dalits and minorities, as “Pehle Darshan, phir Aashirwad”, meaning worship first and blessings afterwards.
The exchanges come ahead of Uttar Pradesh’s 2027 assembly election, with rival parties disputing both the political meaning of temple visits and the interpretation of earlier events in Ayodhya. The BJP has sought to challenge the Samajwadi Party’s historical position on the Ram temple, while the latter maintains that it supported resolving the dispute through dialogue or the courts.
The dispute has also drawn attention to differences between personal religious choices and the demands placed on elected representatives.
The Ayodhya temple was consecrated in January 2024. Yadav’s proposed December visit would be his first to the temple since that ceremony, making his announcement a focus of political attention even before the trip takes place.
Uttar Pradesh minister Dayashankar Singh separately questioned the Samajwadi Party’s record on Ayodhya’s development during its years in government. He contrasted its approach with the large-scale Diwali celebrations organised under the present state administration, an issue the BJP has repeatedly used to distinguish its policies from those of its opponents.
