BJP Goa president birthday party in temple sparks row in state

Panaji: A cake-cutting ceremony on BJP state president Damodar ‘Damu’ Naik’s birthday along with chief minister Pramod Sawant inside a temple on Saturday sparked a controversy in the state.

The opposition strongly criticised both Sawant and Naik for disrespecting the sanctity of the deity and hurting the sentiments of devotees and demanded both apologise to the people of Goa.

“At Rudreshwar Devasthan, I extended my warm birthday wishes to BJP state president Damodar Naik,” Sawant tweeted, along with the photos at Rudreshwar temple, including the one with the cake.

“Temples are places of worship and devotion, meant for performing rituals, seeking blessings, and preserving our cultural and spiritual heritage. Cake-cutting is a social custom, not a religious ritual,” GPCC president Amit Patkar said.

He said the incident exposed BJP’s hypocrisy of claiming to be the protector of Hindu culture and traditions.

“BJP continues to misuse religious places for their political publicity. Such actions are an insult to Goan ethos and our rich temple traditions. We urge the temple committees and religious leaders to take serious note of this violation, and we demand that the chief minister and the BJP state president apologise to the people of Goa for setting such a wrong precedent,” Patkar said.

AAP Goa unit president and OBC leader Amit Palekar said religious places should not be used for political appeasement or purposes.

“Dev Rudreshwar is the Aradhya Devata of the Bhandari community and followers of Sanatan and is not a place for such birthday parties, as it is a place for spiritualism and attending moksha. BJP should not have used the temple for cake cutting,” he said.

GFP president and Fatorda MLA Vijai Sardesai said he wished Naik good health, happiness, and the wisdom to take his party forward.

“But whether this western tradition of cutting cake in the temple augurs well for BJP is only known to Lord Rudreshwar and some others who directly speak to Goa,” Sardesai said, taking a dig at PWD minister Digambar Kamat who had claimed that he had spoken to God while switching to BJP from Congress.