Mumbai, Dec 19 (IANS) On the day Nitin Gadkari took over as the new president of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), a regional party in Vidarbha Saturday urged him to take up the cause of statehood for the region, failing which he would not be allowed to move freely on his home turf.

The missive to Gadkari - who hails from Nagpur in the heart of Vidarbha - was contained in a statement from Kishor Tiwari, the chief of the Vidarbha Jan Andolan Samiti that is agitating for the new state to be carved out of Maharashtra.

Tiwari said that both the BJP and its predecessor the Jan Sangh had raised the demand for Vidarbha, while Gadkari had written a book in 2003 on the injustice meted out to the region.

'However, when the National Democratic Alliance led by the BJP formed new states (Jharkhand, Uttarakhand and Chhattisgarh), Vidarbha was listed on the top but was deleted due to opposition from your ally the Shiv Sena,' Tiwari pointed out.

He added that though the state unit of the BJP is supporting the Vidarbha demand, Gadkari has remained silent over it, raising suspicions over the party's stand on the issue.

'As the new president of BJP, the people of Vidarbha, your home region, need your clear stand on the issue,' Tiwari urged.

Tiwari urged Gadkari to remember his commitment and take up the cause, failing which the people of Vidarbha would not allow him to move around his home region.