Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot, who arrived in the national capital to participate in the Congress’ ‘Satyagrah’ over the Citizenship Amendment Act and the National Register of Citizens on Monday, said that earlier the people of Maharashtra and Haryana and now Jharkhand have rejected the misleading politics of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah. The trend shows that the people are tired of their divisive politics, he added.
Speaking to the media at the party headquarters here, Gehlot said: “During the Maharashtra and Haryana Assembly polls a message went to the entire country that they (Modi and Shah) are misleading the people on the issues of nationalism, Article 370, and their campaign has no agenda. Rahul Gandhi raised the issues of what the common citizens faced.”
Slamming the BJP, the Rajasthan Chief Minister said that Maharashtra and Haryana gave the message that their “agenda” was not going to work.
“The people of Jharkhand were unhappy and everyone knew that the Congress is going to win. They pressed their entire resources into use in Jharkhand but the message of Sonia Gandhi went to the people. The way in which they are misleading the people, even Prime Minister Narendra Modi misled the people from Ramlila Maidan, but we got a clear mandate in Jharkhand,” he said.
His remarks came as the results from Jharkhand showed that the Grand Alliance comprising the Congress, Jharkhand Mukti Morcha and the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) was set to form the government.
To a question on the Prime Minister referring to him during a rally in Delhi’s Ramlila Maidan over the CAA issue, the Congress leader said: “Amit Shah mentioned in the Rajya Sabha, referring to my name, about writing a letter to the then Home Minister. He is misleading the people of the country.”
“I have a copy of the letter in which I said to the earlier Central government that a lot of refugees stay near the Barmer border in Rajasthan and about 99 per cent of them are Hindus or Sikhs. Earlier, the District Magistrate was empowered to give citizenship after they stayed for two years in the state.
“So during my tenure when it was demanded by the people, I wrote the letter to then Home Minister P. Chidambaram. But I don’t know what kind of love the Prime Minister and Home Minister have for me that they take my name in their interviews and in their election rallies,” Gehlot said.
Lambasting the Central government over the CAA, he said, “The government is scared.”
Lashing out at Modi and Shah, the Congress leader asked, “Who said to bring NRC? The Prime Minister said that we didn’t have discussions over the NRC. The people are confused as the Home Minister has said that we will implement the NRC across the country.”
“This is for the first time that they brought an Act on the basis of religion,” he added.-IANS news
