New Delhi, May 16: Former Congress President Rahul Gandhi’s recent remarks that the regional parties cannot fight the BJP politically as they do not have an ideology has upset several opposition parties.
Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD), CPI(M) and Janata Dal (Secular) have questioned Rahul Gandhi’s comment that only the Congress has the ideology “to take on the BJP”.
Rahul in his address at Congress’ Chintan Shivir in Udaipur on Sunday had claimed that regional parties cannot fight the BJP and the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) as they lack ideology, adding that only the Congress can fight the BJP.
“BJP will talk about Congress, will talk about Congress leaders, will talk about Congress workers, but will not talk about regional parties, because they know, that regional parties have their place, but they cannot defeat BJP. Because they don’t have an ideology,” said Gandhi.
RJD spokesperson Manoj Kumar Jha said regional parties are strong in a majority of Lok Sabha seats in the fight against the BJP, and the Congress should settle to be “co-travellers” and let them be in the “driving seat” in over 320 of the 543 parliamentary constituencies. This is a point RJD leader Tejashwi Yadav has also made, he noted.
“I find it a little bizarre and out of sync,” Rajya Sabha MP Jha told PTI.
Jha said it was the RJD which was at the receiving end of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s attack during elections as it was at the nucleus of the electoral and ideological fight against the BJP.
From RJD president Lalu Prasad Yadav to Tejashwi Yadav, hundreds of RJD leaders and workers have suffered due to the party’s ideological commitment in the fight against the BJP, he claimed.
It was Lalu Prasad Yadav who stood with Sonia Gandhi when her own party leaders did not, he said, in an apparent reference to many then Congress leaders questioning her leadership over her foreign origins and forming the NCP in 1999.
JD(S) leader HD Kumaraswamy said on Monday while taking a swipe at the grand old party leader Rahul Gandhi for his critical comments on those parties.
In an apparent sarcastic note, he asked the former Congress president to elaborate to regional parties about ideological commitment, while saying that the national party has no presence in most parts of the country.
He said the Congress toppled the IK Gujral-led United Front government, demanding that DMK be kept out of the Cabinet by citing the links of the Dravidian party with the LTTE in the backdrop of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi’s assassination. But, the same Congress in the later years shared a cordial, political relationship with that party.
“Is sharing power with the same DMK for 10 years in UPA-1 and -2 governments, led by Manmohan Singh, an ideological commitment?” he questioned in a tweet.
“Is joining hands (with BJP) for the immoral operation ‘Lotus’ through the back door, after coming to our (JD-S) door with an alliance proposal and forming a coalition government with us, an ideological commitment? Is destroying alliance partners ideology-based politics?” he further questioned the Congress.
On the other hand, CPI(M) General Secretary Sitaram Yechury said at a party convention in Kochi, “Compared to the past, today the Congress has become weaker and many in the BJP and RSS do not see the Congress as a big threat because its leaders can leave the party to join the BJP at any point of time.” (Agencies)
