TUTICORIN: Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Saturday said that the democracy is dead. He said that a nation should be balanced with elected institutions like Lok Sabha, assemblies, panchayats, judiciary and free press.
Rahul Gandhi while kicking off a three day campaign in the southern districts of Tamil Nadu on Saturday said, “I am sad to tell you democracy is dead.”
“All these institutions hold the nation, but for the last six years all these institutions were systematically attacked,” he said and added that these acts of RSS are destroying the balances in the country. Even though India is a union of states, the system was destroyed by the RSS and BJP have rendered the states powerless,” he said.
In an interaction with advocates at VOC College in the city, he said despite people giving the mandate to the Congress in Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Goa, Jharkhand, Pondicherry and Arunachal Pradesh they dislodged or there were attempts to dislodge them from power. “I know the amount of money thrown at Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan,” he said.
Stating that the government is using its arms such as the ED, CBI and IT to target MLAs, the Congress leader said that they are forced to switch sides. If a man like an MLA cannot sustain such pressures, how can others? He asked and did not blame the Congress MLAs who were responsible for pulling down their government.
Rahul said that one party (BJP) has thousands and thousands of crore rupees and other parties are not allowed to raise funds. “Donors are interested in contributing to our party. But if a company donates one rupees to us, their business is destroyed,” he said and claimed that he has recordings of such conversations.
Having 10 to 15 MLAs more than the required majority is of no use as the ED, CBI and other enforcement agencies are used to threaten them and dislodge the government. Stressing on the need for strong anti-defection laws to be passed to avoid such instances, he said that it requires the parliament to pass them.
“We are not allowed to speak in the parliament. Really,” he said. He said that the RSS and BJP have completely penetrated into the judiciary, bureaucracy and media. We are facing a huge challenge now. He said that we are going through a situation that is very much likely to fighting the British.
He added that there is one place where we can get a remedy and that is the people, who alone can save this country. “I have been honest throughout my whole political career. No ED, CBI is going to affect me. That is why no corrupt charges can be levelled against me. That is why they keep attacking me 24×7,” Rahul said.
Stressing on the need for a cooling period of a few years for judges before accepting government assignments, he said that we have seen examples of judges taking decisions for the governments. He also felt that increasing the number of courts and judges may be a remedy to resolve the long list of pending cases.
Batting for 50 per cent reservation for women in the parliament, assemblies and in every institution across the country, he said that women should be given more space and that “Indian men need to change the way they look at women.”
He expressed disbelief on the reliability of EVMs stating that it has proved to be vulnerable to manipulation even in many developed countries.
Commenting on the CAA and Farm laws, he said that CAA is highly discriminatory on many grounds and the farmer laws have been designed to wreck the Indian agriculture system while two or three big companies are getting benefited out of it.
Accusing RSS and BJP of launching a full-fledged attack on Secularism, that is the foundation of the country, he said that all of us should fight this assault. At this juncture he said that people in the judiciary have an important role to play by standing up against their ideology.
Rahul interrupted an advocate who called Prime Minister Narendra Modi useless and added that everything has some use or the other. “To whom is he useful? He is useful to ‘Hum Do Hamare Do’. Those two are using the PM to increase their wealth drastically. When time comes they will throw him like that,” he said.
“China knows that the Prime Minister is afraid of them,” he said repeatedly. Rahul said that China first tested India by occupying Doklam, followed by Ladakh and Arunachal Pradesh. But the PM denied it. He said that they had the courage to occupy several thousand kilometres as their intrusions were not opposed.
“Our land is not going to come back to us under this government. India will lose land. China will not stop at Ladakh,” he said and added that there was a similar attempt by China in 2013 when the Congress was in power but the then government gave a fitting reply and had pushed them back.