Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday claimed that the Congress repeatedly wounded the Constitution, while the Bharatiya Janata Party brought about amendments to it only to unite the country.
Replying to a two-day debate in the Lower House of Parliament about the completion of 75 years since the adoption of the Constitution, Modi said that the Nehru-Gandhi family “challenged the Constitution at every level” and “changed it to attack freedom of expression”.
The prime minister also said that the Congress was using the Constitution as a tool to frighten people.
Modi claimed that prime ministers from the Congress, from Jawaharlal Nehru to Rajiv Gandhi, strongly opposed reservation. He noted that it was only when the Congress was removed from power that Other Backward Classes got reservations, referring to the VP Singh-led government accepting the Mandal Commission report in 1990.
The prime minister alleged that the Congress was trying to introduce reservations based on religion – a claim that he and other Bharatiya Janata Party members have made several times earlier without citing evidence. He claimed that the Congress, after facing setbacks from the Supreme Court, was trying to implement religion-based quotas under different pretexts.
On Friday, the debate on the adoption of the Constitution saw Congress MP Priyanka Gandhi Vadra making her maiden speech in the Lok Sabha, during which she said the BJP would have begun changing the Constitution if not for the 2024 Lok Sabha election results, in which the Hindutva party failed to get a majority on its own.
Vadra said: “The truth is that they are chanting ‘Constitution’ because these elections have made them realise that it is the people of this country who will protect it.”
Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi also spoke during the debate on Saturday, and said that the BJP was “ridiculing” Hindutva idealogue VD Savarkar by talking about protecting the Constitution.
He referred to a statement by Savarkar that there was “nothing Indian” about the Constitution and that Hindu scripture Manusmriti was the “most worshippable after the Vedas for our Hindu nation”. Gandhi claimed that Savarkar had indicated that the Manusmriti should supersede the Constitution.
The Manusmriti is a Hindu scripture authored by an ascetic named Manu. The text has been widely criticised for its gender and caste-based codes.
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