Jammu: Congress leader and former AICC president Rahul Gandhi Tuesday stated that his heart was “not full of hatred against anybody” and his Yatra, had been “all about love and affection.”
He maintained that he could not understand how a Yatra which was “bringing people of India together” could harm her (India’s) interests. In fact it was the ideology of BJP and RSS, which was defaming the nation by spreading hatred and violence, he alleged.
In a special presser at Jhajjar Kotli before moving to Yatra’s last leg in Srinagar, Rahul was responding to a query about the Defence Minister Rajnath Singh’s statement. Singh had accused Rahul of spreading hatred across India through his diatribes during his ‘Bharat Jodo Yatra’ and thus defaming the country even abroad just out of his hatred and vengeance against the Prime Minister and BJP.
“The (My) heart is not full of hatred. In fact, I am very respectful and I don’t have hatred for anybody. Nobody in this Yatra has attacked or abused anybody else. As far as Rajnath Singh’s statement is concerned, I can see how his party is dividing India between religions, communities, castes and genders and is harming the country. The newspapers abroad are asking the question as to what has happened to India’s traditional values, brotherhood, which has been its strength,” he said.
Seemingly irked over this query, Rahul said that he would be surprised if these were his (Rajnath’s) actual views. It’s nice that he (Rajnath) had expressed his opinion yet seemingly he (Singh) would have been ordered to do so, he alleged.
PRICKLY QUERIES ON DIGVIJAY SINGH TEST RAHUL’S PATIENCE
Though the entire organisation (Congress) tried hard to duck queries on its senior leader and former Chief Minister of Madhya Pradesh’s controversial remarks about India’s surgical strikes post-Pulwama attack and save Rahul from discomfiture yet it did not happen.
Rahul faced most prickly queries on this issue and in different formats. For most part of the time, he maintained his cool as he tried to tackle these questions deftly with his new found confidence.
“Congress party won freedom for this country and created all its institutions while BJP-RSS and their mentor Savarkarji helped the British to divide it (India) with its ‘Two-nation theory.’ So they cannot target Congress. As regards Digvijay Singhji’s remark, I personally completely disagree with it. We fully trust our army and it does not need to give any proof for its actions. Congress’ stand is that it is the personal opinion of Digvijay Singh and it does not reflect party’s opinion,” he said.
Responding to a query as to why no action was initiated against him (Digvijay), former Congress president said, “We are a democratic party and we are not a dictatorship. We don’t run our party with principles of coercion. We don’t appreciate his personal views, but, the views of the party are above his views. His views are outlying views. We are absolutely crystal clear that the armed forces do a job. They do a job exceptionally well and they do not need to provide proof for anything. We allow conversations, unlike BJP-RSS.”
But his patience did not last long and finally his suppressed anger found manifestation in his words as he said, “Sometimes, there are people in every conversation, who will say ridiculous things and in this case, I am sorry to say this about a senior leader yet he said a ridiculous thing.”
Putting a brave-face, Rahul said that Singh’s statement would not “undo the good work of Bharat Jodo Yatra.”
“The yatra has achieved something fundamental and very powerful and this cannot be changed now. It has shown that there are two visions of India. One is a hate filled, arrogant, cowardly vision and other is love filled, embracing, and brave vision and it has made those two visions absolutely crystal clear. One or two comments that are said by a leader, are not going to change the fundamental fact that the Yatra has been a success,” he said.