Congress’ concern on tolerance joke of the century, says BJP

The BJP and the Congress on Monday traded charges against each other following a political row that erupted with historians, writers and activists returning awards to protest what they call growing intolerance.

The ruling party mocked Congress’ protest, saying its concern for tolerance was the joke of the century and akin to the devil quoting the scripture. Parliamentary affairs minister M Venkaiah Naidu also hit out at the protesting activists, asking why they had remained silent when fundamental rights were curbed during Emergency or during the anti-Sikh riots of 1984.

Naidu reiterated that of the protesting writers and historians, many were anti-Modi even before returning their awards. “Some of the writers and filmmakers may have been misguided to believe that the situation has worsened whereas the NCRB data shows a decline in communal incidents or atrocities on Dalits,” Naidu said.

Naidu alleged that there was a motivated campaign to malign the Modi government and wondered why some gruesome incidents in non-BJP ruled states did not invite the same kind of outrage.

An unfazed Congress, however, hit back at Modi on the anti-Sikh riots, saying that the PM, like in the 2002 post-Godhra violence, had “forgotten Rajdharma” in 2015 as he was an “endorser of intolerance by his studied silence” over acts of hate and violence.

Congress also accused the PM of doing “lasting damage” to the country’s social fabric by “selective targeting of the minority community”.