‘Storm set to arrive, Oppn to oust BJP’: Gandhi at rally with Stalin
CHENNAI: Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Friday said that a “storm is set to arrive” and exuded confidence that the Opposition Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) will dislodge the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) at the Centre, as he addressed a joint rally with his ally, Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) president and chief minister MK Stalin, in Coimbatore city of Tamil Nadu ahead of the Lok Sabha elections.
Stalin, on the other hand, hailed the Congress’s manifesto for the upcoming polls as “election hero” and said the document was in tune with the DMK’S ideology of ensuring social justice.
The ruling DMK is fighting the coming elections with the Congress, along with other smaller parties, in the southern state. As per the seat-sharing arrangement among the INDIA bloc partners, the DMK will fight on 21 out of 39 Lok Sabha seats, two lower than what it contested in 2019. The Congress will fight on nine seats (contested nine seats in 2019 as well) and the lone Lok Sabha seat in Puducherry.
“A storm is set to arrive. (Prime Minister) Narendra Modi is going to be dislodged from power,” Gandhi said.
The bonhomie between the Congress and the DMK was evident as Stalin welcomed Gandhi as “dear brother”, to give a “new dawn for a new India”. In return, the former Congress chief addressed the DMK president as “elder brother” and said he never addresses any other politician as his brother.
Describing the Congress’s manifesto as the “election hero”, Stalin said: “Through his (Gandhi’s) yatras, Gandhi learnt of people’s problems and came up with his party’s manifesto.”
He was referring to the Congress’s Bharat Jodo Yatra,which was held from Kanyakumari in September 2022 to Srinagar in January 2023 and the Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra, which was held from Manipur in January this year to Mumbai in March.
“The Congress manifesto reflects social justice championed by DMK,” the chief minister said.
At the rally, Gandhi alleged the Narendra Modi government is an “Adani government”.
“Narendra Modi and Adani policies have created two Indias. One India of billionaires and the other India of poor people. The Modi government actually is Adani government, it should be called Adani govt and not Narendra Modi government,” he said. Be it airport, highway, any infra project; somehow the (central) government “just gives it” to Adani, he claimed.
Last year in January, the Congress and several other opposition parties cornered the Bjp-led Centre and even disrupted the Budget session of Parliament over allegations of fraud and stock manipulation against the
Adani Group by American securities research firm Hindenburg Research. The conglomerate had denied those charges too.
The Opposition had sought a probe by a joint parliamentary committee (JPC). The Supreme Court, in January this year, shot down a plea jointly made in a bundle of petitions, seeking the creation of a special investigation team (SIT) to investigate the allegations.
Gandhi said the upcoming elections are an “ideological battle” and “no longer a normal election”.
The rights of the people of the country, their histories, languages and their way of life is protected by the Constitution, he said. “The Constitution is not an ordinary book, it is the soul, it is the voice of India’s people. That soul and that voice is being attacked by the Prime Minister and by the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh,” he said.
He also slammed BJP leaders for saying “they are going to change the Constitution” if they retained power at the Centre.
The Congress leader’s comments came on a day Modi dismissed the Opposition’s charges that the BJP was out to destroy the Constitution and said his government revered it and even Babasaheb Ambedkar would not be able to abolish it now.
At a separate rally in the southern state’s Tirunelveli city, Gandhi slammed Modi for allegedly attacking Tamil culture, history, tradition and language. “Tamil farmers are starving and Tamil youth are unemployed,” he said. Gandhi also dubbed the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET) “anti-poor”. In Tamil Nadu, the argument against NEET has been that it disadvantages students from rural and poor backgrounds (who cannot afford coaching), and those studying in boards other than the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE). There was no immediate reaction from the BJP.