Big lie: Kharge on PM’s charge of Congress intention to raze temple
New Delhi, May 22
Congress chief Mallikarjun Kharge on Wednesday brushed aside Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s charge that the Congress would run a bulldozer on the Ram Temple if it came to power and said it was a “complete lie”.
He said the Congress had been in power for 55 years, but it never stopped anyone from worshipping anyone or had taken away anyone’s mangalsutra, as claimed by the PM.
“This is a complete lie. No one from our party has spoken like this and neither is it written anywhere. We respect all sects and religions and honour everyone’s faith,” he said.
Helping poor not appeasement
The BJP tries to project everything that the Congress does as appeasement… Giving the poor something, or giving scholarship to the poor, giving education through special schools for Muslims cannot be termed as appeasement. —Mallikarjun Kharge, Congress Chief
Kharge said helping the poor in any community was not appeasement, as alleged by the BJP. The BJP and Modi started the work of dividing people, he said. The BJP did such things for votes and accused others of using the bulldozer, he added.
Kharge accused the BJP of creating false propaganda against the Congress every time it came out with schemes to help the poor during the UPA government.
The Congress chief said when the party first brought MGNREGA, Food Security Act, Rural Health Mission, the BJP opposed the steps.
Rubbishing criticism of practising politics of appeasement, he said, preventing injustice on any community was not appeasement. The BJP tries to polarise people during elections, he alleged.
“The BJP tries to project everything that the Congress does as appeasement. I will only say that the BJP does appeasement politics. Giving the poor something, or giving scholarship to the poor, giving education through special schools for Muslims cannot be termed as appeasement,” he said.
On BJP’s claim that the Congress wanted to give religion-based quotas and that was why the call for raising the reservation ceiling, Kharge said it was meant to provide reservation to the poor.
He said the Congress had the Tamil Nadu model in mind where there was 69 per cent reservation. “We are saying we will raise the limit like in Tamil Nadu. How do the Muslims come in? We want to provide reservation to the economically weaker sections and do Muslims not come among them?” he said.
Justifying the demand for holding a caste census, the Congress chief said it was to ensure giving something to the communities that had been left out in the past. “Wherever the poor need to be helped, backwards need the help, we will create a policy for them. Just like Jawaharlal Nehru formulated the five-year plans, similar things have to be given to those who have not been given the benefits of development so far. We are not snatching anyone’s rights,” he said.
