by admin | May 25, 2021 | News, Politics
New Delhi : The Congress on Saturday said that the very basis of the polity is threatened by the ideology of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh (RSS) and their affiliates which have created an environment of distrust, fear and intimidation threatening to tear apart the country’s social unity and harmony.
It also accused Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the BJP government of being of being “intolerant” of any criticism and remaining in “arrogant denial”.
“In pursuit of its insidious and divisive agenda, they have inflamed communal passions and hyper nationalism,” said the political resolution adopted at the party’s two-day Plenary here.
“The RSS-BJP is misrepresenting, distorting and misusing religion to exploit the sentiments of the people and capture political power,” it said adding, “The toxic mix of religion and politics, poses a challenge to our pluralistic society and inclusive democracy.”
Slamming the RSS, it said, “RSS, which claims to be a social and cultural organisation, masquerades as sole representative of the Hindus.”
The resolution also claimed that the Indian tradition and the essence of Hinduism has been all encompassing, upholder of humane values and our composite culture. “It is distinct and must not be confused with Hindutva, which is essentially a political ideology.”
Attacking the BJP and the RSS for not participating in the national freedom struggle, the resolution said “The RSS and BJP, claim to be custodians of nationalism and patriotism. It is ironical since they are ideological descendants of the non participants of the freedom struggle,” it said.
“Congress – a Party, which led the freedom struggle with its leaders and workers making great sacrifices, therefore, needs no lessons from the RSS-BJP on nationalism and patriotism,” it said.
The Congress also called upon the people of the country to defend and uphold the spirit of ‘Sarva Dharma Sambhav’ and India’s ancient wisdom as encapsulated in ‘Vasudhaiva Kutumbkam’.
The Congress resolution emphasised that forces of communalism and violence have no place in a civilized society.
“No cause can justify terror and violence against innocent civilians and no religion gives that sanction. Congress condemns communalism and terrorism in all its manifestations and reaffirms its resolve to fight such forces,” it said.
The Congress Plenary, unequivocally commits to defend the fabric of social unity, secularism and constitutional democracy.
The party accused BJP and RSS of misrepresenting and misusing religion to exploit the sentiments of the people and capture political power and said that it needs no lessons from them on “nationalism and patriotism”.
The political resolution expressed concern over the assault on foundation principles of the Constitution.
“India is confronted today by a systematic assault on the foundational principles of our Constitution and the values of Indian republic, by the outfits and organisations affiliated to the ruling RSS-BJP combine,” the resolution said.
It also said that the lifeline of Indian democracy is “inclusion and secularism”.
The Congress also charged the government with undermining established norms of governance and subversion of educational, cultural and historical institutions, facilitating their capture by BJP’s ideological affiliates.
“RSS infiltration of every Institution, administration and the universities, poses a threat to pluralism and Indian Democracy. The centralisation of authority, arbitrary and partisan decision making, has cast a dark shadow on Parliamentary democracy,” it said.
Accusing BJP of misusing the constitutional offices to acquire power, it said, “The BJP government, has brazenly misused the constitutional office of Governors and resorted to unethical means to destabilise elected Governments, hijack popular mandates and foisting governments by manufacturing majority.
“The BJP government is insensitive and disrespectful of the above. This calls for strong condemnation,” it said.
The Congress also condemned the BJP for brazen abuse of power and misuse of Central government agencies for targeted political vendetta to harass, humiliate and persecute its political opponents.
“The BJP governments in the states have unleashed persecution and atrocities against the Congress workers.
“The Congress Party warns the BJP and its government, that its undemocratic methods and acts to curtail liberty, freedom of expression and violation of fundamental rights of the citizens as enshrined in the Constitution will be strongly resisted,” it added.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | News, Politics
New Delhi : Congress President Rahul Gandhi on Saturday said the country, feeling tired under the Modi government, was seeking change in the 2019 general election and only his party can show the path forward.
In his presidental remarks at the party’s 84th Plenary here, Gandhi said the meeting was aimed at setting the future direction not only of the Congress but of the entire country.
Gandhi targeted Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his governmnent, which will complete four years in office in May. He said the country was looking for a change in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections.
He accused the ruling Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP) of dividing the society and said that only Congress can heal the divisions.
“Today anger is being spread in the country, the country is being divided and people are being made to fight each other. But our work is to bring people together.”
He said various sections, including youth and farmers, were feeling disenchanted under the BJP government.
“The crores of youth, who are feeling tired today, when they look towards Modi, they are unable to see a way forward.
“They do not know from where will they get employment, when will farmers get proper price for their crops. The country is in a way tired, is seeking a way out.
“And I say from my heart that only the Congress can show the path to the country,” Gandhi said to cheers from the gathering.
“The aim of plenary is to show the path forward to the Congress and the country. It is talking of the future, it is talking of change.”
The Congress President recalled contributions of leaders including his mother Sonia Gandhi, Manmohan Singh, Punjab Chief Minister Captain Amarinder Singh, Kartanataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah and former Finance Minister P. Chidambaram “in fighting the battle of the Congress” and “protecting its symbol”.
The Congress chief talked of the need for a balance between youth and experience in the party.
“In our tradition, there is change but we do not forget the past. There is talk of youth but I want to say from this stage that youth will take the Congress forward but cannot move ahead without the experienced leaders. My task is to connect the youth and the seniors,” he said.
Gandhi said his task was to show a new direction to the party.
“What is the difference between the Congress and our opposition. There is one big difference. They use anger. We use love, brotherhood. The country belongs to us all, is of every religion, every community and every citizen.
“And whatever the Congress does, it will do for every individual of the country and not leave any one behind,” he said.
Referring to the Congress’ symbol of hand, Gandhi said, “This is the symbol that can bring the country together, take it forward. And the power of this symbol is within you. The work of forging the unity will have to be done together by all of us and people of the country.”
The plenary, being held after eight years, has definitive stamp of Gandhi. Unlike the past, leaders are not seated on the dias. Workers and young leaders have been given more opportunity to speak on the resolutions.
The meeting is being attended by AICC members from all over the country besides office-bearers.A .
Elaborate arrangements have been made for the plenary which will conclude on Sunday.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | Opinions
By Amulya Ganguli,
If one explanation has to be given for the BJP’s electoral ills in the Hindi heartland and nearby states, it is arrogance.
Even more than the Narendra Modi government’s failures on the employment and agricultural fronts, it is the party’s and the government’s haughtiness, reflected in the Vice-president M Venkaiah Naidu’s characterisation of Modi as “God’s gift to the nation”, which has been undermining the party’s standing.
Ever since the BJP came to power, it has been dismissive of everything that happened in the past and vowed to start on a clean slate after eradicating 1,200 years of slavery under the Muslims and the British.
The party also neatly divided the people into “Ramzade” (children of the Hindu god, Ram) and “haramzade” or illegitimate children, as the Union minister, Sadhvi Niranjan Jyoti, so eloquently put it. Any opponent of the party was promptly placed in the anti-national or anti-Hindu category and told to go to Pakistan if he favoured the consumption of beef.
Tourism Minister K.J. Alphons advised visitors from abroad to eat all their beef before coming to India.
The reaction against the BJP’s hauteur was slow to take shape presumably because the people, especially youngsters, retained their faith in the Prime Minister’s “Sabka saath, sabka vikas” or development for all promise. It still works in states like Tripura which has seen little economic growth under prolonged communist rule.
But, elsewhere, the Modi magic has palpably started fading. The first sign was available in the Gujarat assembly elections where the BJP escaped defeat by a narrow margin. After that, the setbacks for the party in the Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh by-elections substantiated the anti-BJP mood.
Now, the Uttar Pradesh by-polls have provided resounding confirmation of the slide in the party’s fortunes in mainland India.
For Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath to lose in his redoubt of Gorakhpur, where he is the head priest of the Gorakhnath temple, is far more indicative of the way the cookie is crumbling than the fall of the former chief minister Manik Sarkar’s government in Tripura, which was a cause of elation in saffron ranks.
For the BJP, the monk-politician’s electoral humiliation is stunning for two reasons. One is that the elevation of this saffron-robed votary of “love jehad” and fake encounters to the Chief Minister’s post was intended by the Modi dispensation to show how much is changing in India as it marches towards a Hindu rashtra.
Adityanath’s ascent was meant to be a kick in the teeth for the “secular” camp which could not believe that a Hindutva hawk would be made the Chief Minister of India’s largest state.
The other reason why the BJP would be stupefied is that it will now have to shelve its decision to field Adityanath as the third main campaigner for the party after Modi and party president Amit Shah. Till now, the Chief Minister had been deputed to election-bound states to boast about the “developments” that were taking place in Uttar Pradesh.
Now, he will be an “unstarred” campaigner as a Congress minister in Karnataka has mockingly said. It is not unlikely that Adityanath will be derided on the next occasion when he addresses an election rally. His admission that over-confidence led to the BJP’s defeats in Gorakhpur and Phulpur is only partially correct, for it was not so much self-assurance which undercut the party but supercilious pride of being saviours of the nation from its “enemies”.
This scornful outlook towards its political adversaries was starkly evident in Bihar where Union minister Giriraj Singh warned voters that Araria will become a “hub of terrorism” if the Muslim candidate was elected. This crude display of communalism did not deter the voters.
The three or four “captive” television channels of the BJP have also been ringing alarm bells about the caste-based combination of the Samajwadi Party (SP) and the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), as well as the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD), bringing down the “nationalist” BJP in Uttar Pradesh and Bihar.
Even then, it is clear that the successes of these parties have sent out the message to the Congress and other opposition parties that the ground is ripe for unseating the BJP by a united front.
Till now, the BJP’s only hope of staying afloat was the disarray in opposition ranks. It may have also placed considerable faith in the machinations of cynical old-timers like Mulayam Singh Yadav to create fissures in the non-BJP ranks of the kind which enabled it to win big in Uttar Pradesh last year.
But the times are changing. Young leaders like Akhilesh Yadav have shown that it is possible to overcome the earlier two-decade-old enmity between the SP and the BSP to bring the BJP to heel. The RJD has also demonstrated that its M-Y (Muslim-Yadav) base of support has remained intact despite Laloo Prasad Yadav’s incarceration. Besides, the Bihar outcome has shown that the latter’s son, Tajeshwi, has found his political feet.
There are now several relatively young leaders — Rahul Gandhi, Akhilesh Yadav, Tajeshwi, Jignesh Mewani — who are in the field. As Rahul Gandhi’s recent meeting with Sharad Pawar showed, they are now taking the initiative along with elders like Sonia Gandhi to bring the opposition parties together on a common platform. If they succeed, the BJP’s chances of repeating 2014 in the next general election are dim.
(Amulya Ganguli is a political analyst. The views expressed are personal. He can be reached at amulyaganguli@gmail.com)
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | News, Politics
By Sheikh Qayoom,
Jammu : The decision by Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti to drop Haseeb Drabu from her council of ministers for his remarks at a business meet in Delhi is being hotly debated in political circles – especially what its consequences could be on the state’s PDP-BJP ruling coalition.
By doing what she has done, the Chief Minister has proved that she is prepared take political risks — and taking her for granted is something her colleagues and allies should learn not to do.
Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) leaders were aghast after Drabu, who was the Finance Minister, was quoted as telling a meeting organised by the PHD Chamber of Commerce and Industry in New Delhi that Kashmir was not a political problem and a conflict state but a “social problem”. He said this while seeking investments in the state from businessmen and saying the conditions in the state were conducive to business “where you will find some very interesting opportunities” not just to make money but also to have “a lot of fun and enjoy yourselves”.
PDP Vice President Sartaj Madni had said this was something which negated the very existence of the PDP because it is the firm belief of the party that Kashmir is political problem that needed political remedies to resolve.
Interestingly, instead of voices being raised in Drabu’s favour by his own party men, leaders of the PDP’s coalition unlikely partner Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) seem to be more worried about the decision to drop him.
Some senior BJP leaders have rushed to Delhi to discuss the development and its fallout on the ruling coalition with the central leadership of the party.
How important Drabu had been for the PDP was proved not once, but many times in the past. The late Mufti Muhammad Sayeed trusted him to work out the terms of the agenda of alliance with BJP National Secretary Ram Madhav that finally paved the way for the present PDP-BJP coalition.
“Mufti Sahib always loved him and would overlook what some of his party men would say about Drabu Sahib,” said a PDP insider, not wishing to be identified.
In a letter released to the media after he was dropped from the cabinet, Drabu expressed sorrow for not being told by the Chief Minister or her office about the decision to drop him.
“I read it on the website of daily ‘Greater Kashmir’. I tried to call the Chief Minister, but was told she was busy and would call back. I waited, but my call was never returned,” he rued.
He also said in his letter that he had been quoted out of context by the media and that he what he had said was that Kashmir is not only a political problem, but that “we must also look beyond this”, Drabu clarified.
Sayeed made Drabu his economic advisor during his 2002 chief ministerial tenure and later made him the chairman of the local Jammu and Kashmir Bank. In fact, Drabu became the point man between the PDP and the BJP after the 2014 assembly elections.
The problem is that many PDP leaders had of late started saying that Drabu was more of “Delhi’s man in Kashmir rather than Kashmir’s man in Delhi”. Drabu is reportedly very close to Ram Madhav, the powerful BJP leader who is in-charge of Kashmir affairs, which many say “cost him his job”. It is this image that has been floating around in the PDP that finally cost him his berth in the state cabinet.
While even Mehbooba’s political adversaries, including the National Conference President, Dr. Farooq Abdullah, have welcomed her decision, her allies in the BJP are not happy at all about her decision.
“What did he say? He said it is a social problem and Kashmir is a society in search of itself. Is this wrong? We don’t think this is something for which such a harsh decision should have been taken,” a senior BJP leader told IANS, not wanting to be named.
His successor, Syed Altaf Bukhari, who has been assigned the finance portfolio, took a major decision immediately after taking over. Bukhari announced that the decision to replace the old treasury system by the Pay and Accounts Office (PAO) has been put on hold. The ambitious PAO system was Drabu’s brainchild.
Bukhari’s decision has been welcomed by hundreds of contractors in the state who had been on strike during the last 13 days demanding their pending payments and suspension of the PAO system at least till March 31.
Would Drabu’s ouster be a storm in a teacup or would it have repercussions on the PDP-BJP ruling alliance in the immediate future? Ironically, Drabu’s PDP colleagues say it won’t be, while the BJP leaders in the state say it would.
(Sheikh Qayoom can be contacted at sheikh.abdul@ians.in)
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | News, Politics
New Delhi : Issuing a whip to party MPs to be present in Parliament for the next two days, the BJP on Tuesday hit out at the opposition for “not allowing Parliament to function” and indicated that it will press ahead with the Union Budget-related processes even amid protests.
The Bharatiya Janata Party MPs were informed about the three-line whip — to remain present in both houses of Parliament for the next two days — and its strategy for ensuring the passage of the bills by Parliamentary Affairs Minister Ananth Kumar at a meeting of the BJP Parliamentary Party here.
It was attended by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh, party chief Amit Shah and veteran leader L.K. Advani.
The meeting was addressed by Kumar and Ministers of State for Parliamentary Affairs Vijay Goel and Arjun Ram Meghwal. Modi and Shah didn’t air their views.
Talking to reporters after the meeting, Kumar urged the Congress and other parties to let the house function.
“It seems (Congress leaders) Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi don’t believe in democracy. They speak outside (the house) on democracy but don’t practice it in Parliament. The Congress(men) doesn’t have democracy in their genes,” Kumar said.
He asked other parties to discuss the pending bills constructively.
“We have included all important issues in the list of business. We have also issued a three-line whip to all our MPs. We request all the parties to let the house function and hold constructive discussions,” the Minister said.
The whip is a clear indication that the Narendra Modi government is determined to get on with the completion of the necessary legislative procedures vis-a-vis the Union Budget despite opposition protests.
A BJP leader present in the meeting told IANS on condition of anonymity that the Finance Bill and Demands for Grants have to be cleared in this session and the party had thus asked all its MPs to remain present when that happens.
Both the houses were adjourned early on Tuesday after the Telugu Desam Party and some opposition parties protested on various issues, ranging from grant of special category status to Andhra Pradesh to the Punjab National Bank scam.
—IANS
