Chaitra Krushna Shasthi
Modi tears into Cong anti-Advani tirade
Says Manmohan ‘glorified caretaker Prime Minister’
Maharashtra: The BJP and Congress on Tuesday remained engaged in the riveting “my leader strongest” contest, with Narendra Modi pitching in for LK Advani and Rahul-Priyanka duo batting for Manmohan Singh. While the saffron party attacked the Congress for its pusillanimity on issues ranging from China to Pakistan to internal security and termed Manmohan Singh a “glorified caretaker Prime Minister”, the Congress hailed the Prime Minister as the “Lion of Punjab” and even compared him to Mahatma Gandhi for his “inner strength”.
A day after Singh unleashed his sharpest attack yet against Advani, the Gujarat Chief Minister hit back accusing him of “kneeling down” and the Congress of displaying “helplessness” on security issues whenever in power.
“What was the Congress doing during the India-China War of 1962? I want to ask the Prime Minister who is saying that Advani was wringing his hands: What were the Congress leaders doing with their hands then? Today also, when thousands and thousands of acres of Indian land are with China,” Modi said addressing a public rally in Balasinor town of Kheada district in Gujarat.
“Even today, half of Kashmir is occupied by Pakistan. What kind of strength does it show? I want to ask if the Prime Minister is kneeling down due to helplessness of the Congress or is it part of his habit,” Modi asked.
The Prime Minister had on Monday attacked Advani for his “melting” before terrorists during the Kandahar hijack episode, of “wringing his hands” during the 2002 Gujarat riots, and “weeping in a corner” when the Babri Masjid was demolished.
Modi also raised the issues of Charar-e-Sharif siege, the Rubaiya Sayeed kidnapping episode and the 26/11 attack.
“Instead of attacking Pakistan for what it did to us, they made a CD of television footages of the Mumbai attack, made a file of newspaper clippings, put them in a box and the Home Minister took it to the US. There they cried that our neighbour had beaten us, so please help us,” Modi said, adding, “This is a perfect example of helplessness of the Government.”
“When Indian soldiers captured over 90,000 Pakistani soldiers in Bangladesh, why were they allowed to go free,” Modi asked about the 1975 Indo-Pak war. “If we (BJP) would have been in power at that time, we would have taken half of the Kashmir in exchange of those 90,000 soldiers,” Modi said.
Modi added, “I today allege that under the Narasimha Rao Government, when Manmohan Singh was the Finance Minister, the Congress had given safe passage to five terrorists in Charar-e-Sharif of Kashmir after providing them a feast of chicken biryani for seven days.”
“Manmohan Singh, who was then the Finance Minister, took out the money from the Government treasury. The Rao Government sent that money to Kashmir, where it was used to feed the terrorists with chicken biryani,” he alleged.
Modi said that the Congress had played a vital role in making Mufti Mohammad Sayeed the Chief Minister of Kashmir a few years ago.
“His (Sayeed’s) daughter, who is also a daughter of the Congress gharana, was kidnapped by terrorists and they had released eight terrorists, including Makbul Bhatt, and given them a safe passage to Pakistan," he alleged.
He raised questions on the actions taken by the UPA Government after the 26/11 attack. "What did the UPA Government do? I had then said that there were local people involved in the attack. Even the Mumbai Police Commissioner, who is a Muslim, said that 15 local people were involved in the attack," Modi said, adding, "If you are strong why are you sitting on the 15 names who were involved in the attack. Why don’t you search for them and catch them?"
Addressing a Press conference here on Tuesday, BJP spokesperson Ravi Shankar Prasad said the orchestrated and synchronised verbal assault on Advani’s leadership qualities and the harping on credentials of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, Congress president Sonia Gandhi and her son Rahul on a single day was a clear reflection of the desperation and frustration that is now gripping the top leadership of the Congress in view of the ground realities in favour of the BJP and NDA.
"The people of the country are witness to an exceptional situation where the Congress and its leadership are trying to deflect the national debate on security, price rise, rising unemployment, soft on terror because of vote bank politics and the mess which the country is facing because of highly deplorable record of misgovernance in the last five years," he said.
Not willing to take things lying down, the Congress lashed out at the BJP for its anti-Singh campaign. Congress leader Rahul Gandhi said in a rally at Bhatinda in Punjab that the UPA candidate for the top post was Sher-e-Punjab (lion of Punjab) and the "pride of India."
"The Prime Minister is not a weak candidate. He is Sher-e-Punjab and the pride of India," Rahul said in his brief address to a gathering in Bathinda to muster support for Congress candidate Raninder Singh, who is also the son of former Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh.
In Amethi, Priyanka drew a comparison between Singh and Mahatma Gandhi. Like the Mahatma, Singh too was gentle but strong.
"Take for example Mahatma Gandhi. No one was gentler a person than him, but he was a great and strong leader," Priyanka told reporters, while campaigning for her brother Rahul. She said it would be wrong to judge the strength and firmness of a leader just by his appearance. "Manmohan Singh is a very strong, firm and capable leader," Priyanka added.
Source: dailypioneer.com
