2024 LS polls is ideological battle for saving Indian Constitution, democracy, pluralism, says Rahul Gandhi in Tamil Nadu

Addressing his first election rally in Tamil Nadu this season at Palayamkottai, he said the INDIA bloc was fighting for freedom and equality while the BJP-led combine and Prime Minister Narendra Modi-led government was backing the ideals of the RSS.

Terming the upcoming 2024 Parliamentary polls an ‘ideological battle’ between the INDIA bloc and the BJP for saving Indian Constitution, democracy and pluralism, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on April 12 exuded confidence that the INDIA bloc will win this battle with the people’s overwhelming mandate.

Addressing his first election rally in Tamil Nadu this season at Palayamkottai, he said the INDIA bloc was fighting for freedom and equality while the BJP-led combine and Prime Minister Narendra Modi-led government was backing the ideals of the RSS. While the INDIA bloc believed in pluralistic nation with many different languages and varied cultures, BJP was professing its theory of one nation, one language, one culture and one leader. But, for the INDIA bloc, all are equal for which the ideological battle is on.

According to him, in this line, sustained attacks were being made on Tamil, Tamil culture, history and their tradition and any attack on Tamil was nothing less than attack on Tamils. There could be no India without Tamil, Bengali and other Indian languages and all Indian traditions, languages, culture, history etc. are sacred.

Mr. Rahul charged while ₹16 lakh crore loans given to 21 Indians had been happily waived by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, he was refusing to give-up crop loans availed by Indian farmers. Even as farmers were protesting for their genuine demands and “30 farmers were killing themselves everyday due to crop loss”, lack of minimum support price for their crop, monsoon vagaries etc, the Modi-led government was not ready to forgive their loans.

He claimed only 2 or 3 large industrialists – none of them from Tamil Nadu - were being given government contracts and other benefits. “Just because Adani was close to the Prime Minister and he was helping the Prime Minister, ports, airports, wind, solar, coal power units, defense sector contracts were being given to Adani even as the entire micro, small and medium enterprises had been decimated by demonetization and GST,” he claimed.

The Congress leader alleged the ED, CBI and IT were being used as political weapons to target the political opponents including the Opposition leaders and the Chief Ministers, who were put behind the bars. The Prime Minister, who had chosen the Election Commissioners, had frozen the Congress’s bank accounts just 2 months ahead of the elections. Even as Mr. Modi was enjoying monopoly over India’s finances and communication systems, his MPs were openly threatening that they would change Indian Constitution, he alleged.

“Hence, India, which was once beacon of democracy as termed by the World, is no longer a democracy,” Mr. Gandhi said.