Emergency was a mistake, says Rahul Gandhi; talks about father, Prabhakaran
New Delhi: Emergency in 1975 was absolutely a mistake, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi said on Tuesday, video-interacting with economist, professor Kaushik Basu. “I think that was a mistake. Absolutely, that was a mistake. And my grandmother said as much. But the Congress party did not want to capture India’s institutions. We do not have that capability,” Rahul Gandhi said.
“What RSS is doing today is something different. They are capturing all constitutional institutions. So even if we defeat the BJP, we are not going to get rid of the RSS people in the institutions,” Gandhi said citing the present situation in Pondicherry. He also mentioned how the Congress government in Madhya Pradesh could not work because of the RSS force in all institutions.
On being asked about internal democracy in the party, Rahul Gandhi said to Basu, “You are asking this to a person who has been pushing for elections in the party, in youth organisations for a decade. I was literally crucified for this. I have been attacked by my party people.”
“Nobody asks whether there is internal democracy in BJP, BSP (Bahujan Samaj Party) or Samajwadi Party (SP). There is a reason. We are an ideological formation. So it is more important for us to be democratic. It doesn’t matter whether others are,” Rahul added.
Talking about Rajiv Gandhi’s assassination, Rahul Gandhi said it was more painful for him as a son to see Rajiv Gandhi walking towards his death, knowing that he won’t come out of what he was fighting than the actual death.
“It made me understand violence. It made me understand the other. So I remember it’s a strange thing, I saw my father’s killer lying on a Sri Lankan beach. And I felt bad for him. I was really upset for him. He is somebody else’s father. So when someone talks about violence, I sort of sit quietly and say you don’t actually understand violence. That’s why you are so enamoured by you.”
“When Prabhakaran (LTTE leader) died, I picked up my phone and called my sister and said Priyanka this is strange that I am feeling bad. I should be happy about this. I am feeling disturbed that why are they humiliating the man like this. And Priyanka said she was feeling the same,” Gandhi said.
Talking about the RSS model, Rahul Gandhi said a former RSS person met him and explained to him the entire model.
“He said the innovation of Narendra Modi is to take large capital and fund RSS which used to be an organisation of small shopkeepers. So now the model is to scale up RSS using 2,3,5,7 crony capitalists. The Gujarat model is actually giving thousand of crores to RSS modules,” Rahul said.
“He told me that the model was first tried on Pramod Mahajan. But it failed. It was done well by Narendra Modi in Gujarat. Crony capitalists have found out that to capture the political system, the route is through RSS,” Rahul Gandhi said. (Agency)
