Stepping up his attack on the BJP government, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi has alleged that there are “brutal attacks” on the fabric of Indian democracy and that the country’s institutions are under attack across the board.
The opposition leader, who is in London as part of a tour of Britain, told reporters that there was a “state of anger” within the opposition to unite around an alternative vision for the country and pressing issues such as unemployment. Negotiations are underway to work on Inflation, concentration of wealth and violence against women.
The 52-year-old former Congress president cited the Income Tax Department’s recent survey drive against BBC offices in New Delhi and Mumbai as an example of “suppressing voices across the country”, a motivating factor behind his ‘Bharat’. Joko Yatra, which he described as a voice against the ruling BJP’s attempt to silence the country.
“The reason the trip is necessary is because the structures of our democracy are under brutal attack,” Gandhi told reporters at the India Insights event organized by the Indian Journalists Association (IJA) on Saturday evening.
“The media, institutional structures, judiciary, parliament are all under attack and we are finding it very difficult to convey the voice of the people through normal channels,” he alleged.
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“The BBC has found out about it now, but it has been going on non-stop for the last nine years in India. Everyone knows that journalists are intimidated, attacked, and threatened. are given. The government is rewarded. So, this is part of a pattern and I would expect no different. If the BBC stops writing against the government, everything will be back to normal. All cases disappear. will be,” he noted.
Gandhi lamented that the democratic parts of the world, including America and Europe, failed to notice that “a large part of democracy has been lost”.
“BJP wants India to be quiet. They want it to be quiet because they want to be able to give what belongs to India to their closest friends. That’s the idea, to distract the population and then hand it over. . India’s wealth is up to three, four, five people,” he said.
Gandhi’s earlier comments at the University of Cambridge that Indian democracy was under attack and that many politicians, including himself, were under surveillance, invited sharp reactions from the BJP, which after suffering successive electoral setbacks against him, had Accused of tarnishing the country’s image on Earth.
Information and Broadcasting Minister Anurag Thakur told reporters in Delhi, “We can understand their hatred towards the Prime Minister but the conspiracy to defame the country with the help of foreign friends raises questions about the agenda of the Congress.” on Friday.
Thakur said that Gandhi was aware of the kind of defeat Congress was facing in the assembly elections and resorted to blaming it on foreign soil.
“Once again, the Congress lost the elections but their bankruptcy became evident when they missed no opportunity to malign India from foreign soil,” Thakur said.
Asked about the plans of the Congress and the opposition for the next general elections, Gandhi said on Saturday that the election battle is not only between political parties but also against institutions as there is “no level playing field” in Indian politics. .
“There are talks going on between the opposition parties, I am aware of many of them. The basic idea that the RSS and the BJP need to be fought and defeated is deeply ingrained in the minds of the opposition. There is no question about that. he said
“There are strategic issues that need to be discussed, but it is important to understand that the opposition in India is no longer fighting a political party. We are now fighting the institutional structure of India; the BJP and the RSS which have captured almost all of India’s institutions. So, the idea of a level playing field does not exist because the institutions are not fair,” he said.
Gandhi also hit back at the government’s criticism that he had maligned the country on foreign soil during his lecture at Cambridge University earlier this week, where he first raised the issue of Indian democracy being “under attack”. was
He said, “I have never maligned my country, I have no interest in it, I will never do that. The BJP likes to twist my words, in fact the person who goes abroad Discredits India. The Prime Minister of India said that there was a lost decade, and nothing happened in the last 10 years ¿ so what about all the people who worked in India, who built India in those 10 years? Aren’t they insulting them? And, he?s doing it on foreign soil.
The Congress MP added that billions of dollars are behind some of the narratives being presented and pointed the finger at Adani Group founder and chairman Gautam Adani.
“Mr Adani seems to win every auction he participates in,” Gandhi said.
When asked about India-China relations, Gandhi said that India needed to be very wary of “hostile” and “aggressive” movements by the Chinese on the border and referred to his Cambridge lectures on the need for global production to move away from coercion. reiterated his points from A more democratic structure to China.
Gandhi is in London as part of a week-long tour of the UK for a lecture as a visiting fellow at Cambridge University and is scheduled to interact with the Indian diaspora on Sunday.
He is also being hosted at an event at the House of Commons complex on behalf of the UK’s opposition Labor Party and the Chatham House think-tank in London on the Russia-Ukraine conflict and wider geopolitical issues before concluding his trip to Britain. will address the tank.
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