Rahul slams PM Modi for personal attacks against him

Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi on Friday hit back at Prime Minister Narendra Modi for launching personal attacks against him but not anwsering questions posed to him about the burning issues of the day.

Gandhi said Modi made him listen to the quotes of his father Rajiv Gandhi and grand-mother Indira Gandhi, instead of giving a response to his four questions in his speech in Lok Sabha on Thursday.

“Prime Minister Narendra Modi yesterday made a one-hour-and-15 minute-long speech in Parliament and he made personal attacks on me. He made me listen to Rajiv Gandhi and Indira Gandhi’s quotes. But did not answer a single question I had asked him. I respect him. He is the country’s Prime Minister. I asked him four questions but he did not answer,” Gandhi said, addressing a rally in Barak Valley in Silchar.

“Launch personal attacks at me as much you want and enjoy it, but do answer my four questions. In my speech, I had said nothing personal against Modi,” he said.

Gandhi referred to the four questions he had raised in his speech in the Lok Sabha on Wednesday. “I had asked for Modi’s response to his finance minister Arun Jaitley’s ‘fair and lovely’ scheme to make black money white and then what he did to put the Rs 15 lakh black money he promised to put in each Indian’s bank account,” he said.

“The third question I asked him was did you consult Assam Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi and respect the opinion of the people of the state before announcing the Naga Accord”, the Congress scion said.

“The fourth question I put to Modi was how many have been given employment so far under his ‘Make in India scheme’”, he leader said.

Gandhi slammed the PM for “failing” to mention names of Hyderabad University student Rohith Vemula and JNU Students’ Union President Kanhaiya Kumar in his Parliament speech.

“In Parliament he (Modi) did not give a second to Rohith and Kanhaiya because the Prime Minister thinks that there is no necessity to answer the questions India is asking, that our students are asking, as he has become the PM of India. This is wrong as the Prime Minister is not the country and the country is not the Prime Minister,” Gandhi said.

“Rohith’s mother was very hurt. The PM cannot say one word on it. He cannot say that I am sorry that Rohith Vemula committed suicide,” he said.

He asserted that Vemula was “forced to commit suicide due to a letter from a ministry in Delhi to his University”.

“One letter from a ministry in Delhi went to Hyderabad University that you have done wrong. The country’s entire weight was put on one student’s shoulder and he committed suicide. It’s sad”, Gandhi said.

Stating that the RSS was thrusting its ideology on the students, he said: “Rohith Vemula is a symbol of what is happening now. In our colleges and universities, our youth are being terrorised. One ideology – RSS ideology – is being imposed on them.” 

Stating that those who were protesting against this tactic of BJP-RSS were being framed, Gandhi noted, “Sedition charges have been put against me when I work all day for the poor, visit their homes and two of my family members were killed. The country is in my blood. And I am a deshdrohi!”

He said, “Don’t understand why those working for the poor, down-trodden are called deshdrohi (anti-national) and the one who works for 3-4 industrialists is a deshbhakt (patriot)”.

In a jibe at Gandhi, Modi had on Thursday said some people grow in age but not in understanding and claimed that the opposition suffers from “inferiority complex”.

“Some people age but their understanding does not grow. Hence they take time to understand,” he had said, without naming anyone. Modi in his speech had also invoked the statements made by Jawaharlal Nehru, Indira Gandhi, Rajiv Gandhi and first President Rajendra Prasad.