New Delhi: Seeking President Pranab Mukherjee’s intervention for immediate action to “check the state of lawlessness and subversion of democratic rights” in the country, Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi on Thursday called the JNU row and the Patiala House court violence as a “blot” on India’s image.
As Mr Gandhi accused the government of detroying educational institutions and crushing students’ freedom of expression, the BJP hit back saying he had hit a “new low” by supporting “anti-national” voices and said his assertion that nationalism “runs in his blood” was an attempt to “defend” himself after his stand on the issue “sparked anger in the country”.
The BJP asserted that the Indian Constitution guarantees freedom of speech, but it comes with a “lakshman rekha” It asked the Congress not to play with “students’ future” by “politicising” higher educational institutions.
Citing the JNU incident, the BJP said while the Left had a record of siding with such anti-India forces, the Congress too has now joined hands with them.
AAP president and Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal also attacked the Narendra Modi government for the Patiala House incident and claimed such a situation could lead to “dictatorship” in the country.
He insisted that the courts be “shut down” if issues like what is anti-national were to be adjudged outside the judiciary.
Hitting back at the BJP for its “anti-national” dig at him, Mr Gandhi asserted that “nationalism is in my blood. I have seen my family sacrifice again and again and again for this nation”.
Students being bullied, says Rahul Gandhi
Alleging that across India, whether in JNU or Hyderabad Central University, in FTII and other places of learning, students were being “bullied and threatened”, a Congress delegation led by Mr Gandhi told the President: “As the patron of universities, we call upon you to protect their freedom and uphold the values that built our nation.”
Talking to media after meeting the President over the JNU row, Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal said if the Supreme Court’s orders were not followed barely 200 meters from where it sits, “then there will be no such thing called the Constitution.”
