Monday urged Hindus and Muslims in riot-scarred Gujarat state to reconcile, as his Hindu nationalist party wooed Muslim voters before next month's general election.
"Relations between Hindus and Muslims have been tense for a long time. It's time for reconciliation everywhere," Advani told a news conference after filing his nomination papers for election from Gandhinagar, Gujarat's capital city.
Gujarat was the scene of India's worst religious riots in a decade when more than 1,000 people, mostly Muslims, were killed in a series of reprisal attacks in early 2002 after a suspected Muslim mob set fire to a train and killed 59 Hindu activists.
The Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government in Gujarat, headed by Chief Minister Narendra Modi, was accused of not doing enough to stop the religious riots, a charge it denies.
Non-governmental groups put the death toll at over 2,500 and many critics called for Modi to resign or face prosecution.
Advani, who is on what he calls a "Bharat Uday Yatra" or "India Shining Journey" around the country to campaign for the elections, has been promoting an image of religious moderation to garner Muslim and moderate Hindu votes.
He has also made a recent improvement in relations with India's Muslim neighbour and traditional rival Pakistan a central theme of his campaign.
Although it rose to prominence in the early 1990s riding a Hindu revivalist wave, the BJP has moderated its rhetoric in recent years in a bid for the political middle ground and because of the need to build electoral alliances with secular parties.
"We have a government now taking every step at every stage to achieve reconciliation," Advani said.
However, he said reconciliation could not be achieved at the cost of injustice to one section of society.
Recent opinion polls suggest the BJP-led coalition is likely to return to power in the April-May elections, capitalising on a good monsoon and an accelerating economy.