Says talks with China undertaken with ‘full transparency and responsibility’, provides no details on Rafale.
New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi Friday evening accused the Congress party of betraying national interest, by questioning the Army’s “surgical strikes” across the Line of Control in Pakistan, as well as the eyeball-to-eyeball standoff between Indian and Chinese soldiers on the Doklam plateau last year.
“The country won’t forget and forgive the games the Opposition plays on national interest,” Modi said to loud applause, bringing the fiery rhetoric that he has employed often in public campaigns and rallies right into the Lok Sabha. He was speaking during the no-confidence motion against his government.
As he mocked the Opposition right through for being “naamdaar”, belonging to the elite, Modi held himself up as “kaamdaar”, the protector of 125 crore ordinary Indians.
The Congress, he said, was so insensitive that it was dismissing the valour of the Indian soldier who was ready to give his life to protect the country’s unity and integrity.
“How can you question the “surgical strikes and call it jumla strikes,” the PM thundered.
“You can abuse Modi, but you cannot abuse the Indian soldier who is ready to die for the country,” he added.
Again and again, he said, the Congress party questioned his initiatives to make peace with China, never once realising that by doing so it was creating “political instability.”
Talks with China, he said, were undertaken with “full transparency and responsibility,” he said.
The assault on the Opposition by invoking the Indian army was unexpected and it carried on for some time. The shock-and-awe tactics fulfilled their purpose of momentarily silencing the Opposition.
‘Childish arguments on matters of national interest’
The PM touched on the Rafale controversy that Congress president Rahul Gandhi had raised earlier in the day, but did not provide any details.
“We should avoid childish arguments on matters of national interest,” he said. Before he moved on to other issues, the PM had a last stab at the nationalism question with a throwaway remark on the India-Pakistan war of 1971.
“You broke up the country, but the problem stays with us,” Modi said, referring to the Congress Prime Minister Indira Gandhi’s decision to return all territories captured after the 1971 war and even 90,000 prisoners of war.