Photograph: Sansad TV/ANI Photo
Former Congress president Rahul Gandhi has claimed that Prime Minister Narendra Modi was afraid of the Congress as it spoke the truth which is why he attacked the party in both Houses of Parliament.
He also said if the prime minister likes abusing the Congress and his great-grandfather Jawaharlal Nehru, ‘be my guest, but do your job’.
“I do not need anyone’s certificate for my great-grandfather. I don’t care what anybody says about him,” the former Congress chief said.
Replying to the motion of thanks on president’s address, Modi continued his no-holds-barred attack on the Congress declaring even Mahatma Gandhi wanted it dismantled and claiming there would have been no Emergency, no massacre of Sikhs, no caste politics and no exodus of Pandits from Kashmir had the Congress not been there.
Describing dynastic parties as the biggest threat to India’s democracy, he said Jawaharlal Nehru, ‘concerned about his global image’, refused to send the Army to help Ram Manohar Lohia led ‘satyagrahis’ working for Goa’s independence.
The Congress staged a walkout from the House during the prime minister’s address, prompting Modi to say that one needs to listen too in a democracy and that the party was used to only preaching to others till now.
Gandhi said the prime minister did not answer the issues of ‘two Indias’, China and Pakistan ‘getting together’ and the attack on India’s institutions, raised by him in the Lok Sabha.
‘He is a little afraid of the Congress. There is a little anxiety because the Congress speaks the truth. He is in the business of marketing. He has spread lies. So fear is natural and that showed in Parliament.
‘The whole speech was about Congress, what Congress did not do and Nehru did not do. But nothing on BJP’s promises. There is fear,’ he said when asked about the prime minister’s attack on the Congress.
