Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday invoked first Deputy Prime Minister of India Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, while criticising the Congress party in the Lok Sabha for “dividing the country”.
“If Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel would have been the first Prime Minister of the country, then entire Kashmir would have been ours,” he said.
The Prime Minister was speaking on the Motion of Thanks to President Ram Nath Kovind’s joint address to the Parliament.
Modi also hit at the Congress, saying partition of India was result of the party’s wrong policies.
“Partition was a result of Congress’ wrong policies. Not a single day has passed when the country has not suffered due to poison sowed by you,” said PM Modi during his address in the Lok Sabha.
Slamming the Opposition amid the chaos created by them during PM Modi’s address, he said, “You divided the country, despite which the country supported you. You used to rule the nation during a time when the Opposition had no power.”
“Aapne (Congress) pura samay ek parivar ke geet gaane me laga diya, ek hi parivar ko desh yaad rakhe saari shakti usi mein laga di. Agar neeyat saaf hoti toh ye desh jahan hai, usse kahin aage hota. (For decades, one party devoted all their energies to serving one family. The interests of the nation were looked over just for the interests of one family)”, he added.
Prime Minister continued to speak even when the Opposition kept raising slogans, “Democracy is not a reward granted to us by Congress or Nehru ji, democracy is in our blood, it is our tradition.”
Modi said he was pursuing Mahatma Gandhi’s dream of a ‘Congress-mukt Bharat’ and accused the grand old party of eulogising the Gandhi family when in power, at the cost of India’s development.
In the hard-hitting speech, he claimed that his government was an “aim-chaser” as it was achieving targets in a time- bound manner, unlike during the Congress governments which only made announcements and never completed the projects.
He said the non-performing assets (NPAs) of banks were a “sin” of the UPA government, alleging that the Congress was spreading lies to create a sense of disappointment among the middle class about his government. He also gave figures to rebuff opposition criticism on unemployment and other issues.
While Modi spoke for nearly 90 minutes in the Lok Sabha which was marred by continuous slogan-shouting by Congress members from the Well, he delivered a 70-minute speech in the Rajya Sabha later.
Countering opposition criticism over his vision of ‘New India’, he said, “I also want India of Gandhi’s dream. And Gandhi had said since the country has got independence, now Congress is not required and should be disbanded.”
“This Congress-mukt Bharat was Gandhi’s dream. We are trying to follow the path shown by him,” Modi said amid thumping benches by treasury benches.
He said the Congress wanted an India of the Emergency, Bofors, chopper scams and the Tandoor case and wondered if the party wanted a India where thousands of Sikhs were killed after a ‘big tree falls’, in apparent reference to 1984 Sikh riots following killing of then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi.
Throughout Modi’s speech, Congress members were in the Well demanding that promises made to Andhra Pradesh following its division be fulfilled, questioning the Rafale deal and raised slogans targeting him.