Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday hit out at the Congress, accusing it of being a family centric party and ignoring the contributions of country’s first Home Minister Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel. He was speaking at an election rally in Samastipur, Bihar.
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The Congress hit back saying it had organised a country wide satyagrah on Sardar Patel’s birth anniversary — Kisan Adhikar Diwas, where it recalled his contributions to farmers particularly, the Bardoli farmers’ movement. The party said the Modi government had destroyed everything that Patel fought for and achieved.
Congress spokesperson Gaurav Vallabh, at a press conference in the Capital, said Mr. Modi believed in “distract and rule.” Instead of giving an account of his six-year rule or the NDA government’s rule in Bihar, the Prime Minister raked up such issues to distract the voters, Mr. Vallabh said.
“Congress ek parivaar main aisi simat gayi hai ki, kal unki [Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel’s] birth anniversary main unko smarran karne se bhi inke pait main chuhe daudane lage [The Congress is so much centered around one family that their stomachs hurt even while recalling Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel on his birth anniversary],” the Prime Minister said in his speech.
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Reacting to this allegation, Mr. Vallabh said for the BJP Sardar Patel must be new, but for the Congress he was a revered figure. “Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel lives in our hearts. The BJP has to get his statue made in China. BJP gives tickets to those people who called Mahatma Gandhi names, a figure who was revered by Sardar Patel,” Mr. Vallabh said.
He said these issues were raked up in and around an election campaign and that we would see it again return to the political discourse during the West Bengal Assembly elections.
