New Delhi: Responding to the Motion of Thanks on the President’s Address in the Rajya Sabha, Leader of the Opposition Mallikarjun Kharge Monday said, “The mandate (in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections) has broken PM Narendra Modi’s arrogance and the people of the country have shown that they are above Modi’s arrogance.”
During his speech, Congress President Kharge also talked about the prime minister having “lowered the prestige of democracy through his divisive speech during election campaign” and demanded a Supreme Court-monitored investigation into the alleged paper leak in exams conducted by the National Testing Agency (NTA)
Taking a dig at the PM’s “ek akela sab pe bhari” remark, Kharge said, “Ek akela, par aaj kitne log bhaari hain. Election ne dikha diya ki desh ka samvidhan aur janata sab par bhaari hain (elections have proven that the Constitution and the public’s mandate outweigh everything)”
He added that the PM extensively campaigned using a divisive agenda in the name of religion, “lowering the country’s image”, while making remarks against the Congress over redistribution of wealth, ‘mangalsutra’, reservation and ‘mujra’, among others, “which the people of the country rejected”.
According to Kharge, in the past 10 years, the PM has “bulldozed” the Opposition, broken governments in states like Maharashtra and Karnataka, has had Opposition leaders like Hemant Soren and Arvind Kejriwal jailed, and refused to fill the Deputy Speaker post for five years.
“Is he walking alongside the Constitution?” asked Kharge. “Just touching the Constitution to the forehead is not important”.
“The Opposition had to constantly struggle to put forward its views in the House, because BJP’s thinking was that there should be no Opposition in the Parliament. If his thinking had not been like this, then the post of Deputy Speaker would not have been vacant for the first time in the 17th Lok Sabha,” he said.
“In this very House, the Prime Minister had said, ‘one alone is stronger than all’. So, I want to ask today: How many people are more powerful than one single person today? Election results have shown that the country’s Constitution and people are more important than everything else. There is no place for arrogant slogans in democracy. The BJP was talking about changing the Constitution, so the INDIA alliance had to launch a campaign to save the Constitution. The public realised that other issues will come and go, but democracy will survive only if the Constitution survives,” added Kharge.
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‘RSS ideology dangerous for the country’
Kharge Monday said that Prime Minister Modi is an expert in coming up with slogans.
“The PM recently said that the country ‘wants substance, not slogans’, but over the past 10 years, he has made one slogan after another — from ‘Achhe Din Aayenge’ and ‘Make in India’ to ‘Beti Bachao’, ‘Sabka Saath, Sabka Vikas’ and ‘400 par’. Meanwhile, Manipur has been suffering for over a year. He has travelled to 14 countries and given more than 200 speeches during elections, yet he did not go to Manipur for even a single day. He only cares for his few close crony capitalists who funded him through electoral bonds,” said Kharge.
Despite continuous interruptions during his speech, Kharge kept up his attack on Modi.
He alleged that the Modi government plays politics to divert the attention of the public from important issues. “When the Opposition talks about farmers, Narendra Modi talks about the Congress taking away people’s buffaloes. When the Opposition talks about BJP’s divisive thinking, Narendra Modi talks about Aurangzeb and Mughals,” he said. “While the Opposition talks of unemployment and paper leaks, Narendra Modi talks of ‘mangalsutra’ and ‘mujra’. When the Opposition talks about inflation, Narendra Modi talks about inflation abroad. When the Opposition talks about the public, Narendra Modi starts speaking his ‘Mann Ki Baat’.”
“Narendra Modi said that if Congress comes to power, your hard-earned money will be given to intruders. That we will count the gold of our mothers and sisters and distribute it. They are focused on snatching the property of our mothers and sisters by changing the law. If they want to dance for their vote bank then do this — this is the language of the prime minister,” he added.
During a heated exchange, Kharge stated that all of the country’s institutions have been captured by “one organisation”, adding that the RSS and the BJP have destroyed the country’s institutions.
The Congress president brought up the RSS several times during his speech, even alleging that the RSS’s ideology was “dangerous” for the country. His comments were met with uproar in the House, and led Rajya Sabha chairman Jagdeep Dhankhar to ask him whether being a member of any organisation was a crime.
“RSS is an organisation that works for the country and is internationally renowned,” said Dhankhar.
Leader of the House, J.P. Nadda, called Kharge’s comments “irresponsible” and asked that they be expunged. Dhankhar agreed.
Kharge also appealed to the Rajya Sabha chairman to put back the statues of Mahatma Gandhi, B.R, Ambedkar and that of other leaders in their original spots in Parliament complex.
(Edited by Zinnia Ray Chaudhuri)
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