Congress apologised for Emergency but BJP silent on its actions: Mian Altaf

NEW DELHI: Opposition MPs on Saturday accused the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) of attacking the Constitution, with National Conference (NC) MP Mian Altaf Ahmad saying while the Congress apologised for imposing Emergency, the ruling party has been silent on its own actions.

Participating in a debate on 75 years of the adoption of the Constitution, Ahmad slammed the BJP for bifurcating the state of Jammu and Kashmir into two union territories.

“Congress has apologised for the Emergency but you are silent on various things you have done… Congress toppled elected governments, but you divided our state into two Union Territories, which was unnecessary,” he said.

Communist Party of India (Marxist Leninist) Liberation MP Raja Ram Singh named activists like Stan Swamy, who was jailed in the Bhima Koregaon case and died in the prison, Umar Khalid, Gulfisha and Meeran Haider, who have been arrested on the allegations of links with the 2020 Delhi riots.

“What Constitution are we talking about?” he said.

Singh said the idea of economic equality is also enshrined in the Constitution and there should be a proportional difference in the salary of the president and a peon.

“You want a peon for Rs 5,000 but the CEO gets paid Rs 2.5-3 crore… Government is encouraging growing economic disparity,” he said.

The MP also slammed the BJP for wanting to keep “Gandhi in one pocket, and Savarkar in the other pocket”.

“This double standard would not work. BJP is playing with the Constitution, they want to bring communal fascism in this country,” he said.

“The first chapter of the Constitution has the figure of Buddha on it, don’t try to replace it with the Gita,” he said.

Revolutionary Socialist Party (RSP) MP N K Premchandran also pointed out at the growing divide between rich and the poor and said the directive principles speak about minimising inequalities.

He accused the BJP government of trying to concentrate wealth and means of production in a few hands.

“The fruit of so-called economic development is not reaching the poor and the marginalised,” he said, adding that B R Ambedkar had warned that economic and social inequalities will destroy the foundation of democracy.

He also said the secular fabric of the country was under threat. He said people of the country did not give absolute majority to the BJP because they wanted to protect the secular character of the nation. (PTI)