The BJP on Tuesday launched a counter-offensive to the Opposition's Constitution jab, with Prime Minister Narendra Modi using the 49th anniversary of the Emergency as a reason to hit out at the Congress. In a scathing attack on the Congress, Modi wrote on X that those who imposed the Emergency had no right to profess their love for the Constitution.
"Those who imposed the Emergency have no right to profess their love for our Constitution. These are the same people who have imposed Article 356 on innumerable occasions, got a Bill to destroy press freedom, destroyed federalism and violated every aspect of the Constitution," he said.
The mindset which led to the imposition of the Emergency is very much alive among the same Party which imposed it. They hide their disdain for the Constitution through their tokenism but the people of India have seen through their antics and that is why they have rejected them…
— Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) June 25, 2024
He accused the Congress Government of disregarding democratic principles to cling on to power. "Any person who disagreed with the Congress was tortured and harassed. Socially regressive policies were unleashed to target the weakest sections," Modi added.
He further said the mindset which led to the imposition of the Emergency was very much alive among the same Party which imposed it. "They hide their disdain for the Constitution through their tokenism but the people of India have seen through their antics and that is why they have rejected them time and again," the Prime Minister added.
Besides Modi, Union Home Minister Amit Shah too called Emergency the biggest example of the opposition party's long history of killing democracy and harming it repeatedly.
BJP president J P Nadda said on 'X' that those who claim to be the guardians of Indian democracy today had spared no efforts to suppress the voices raised in the defence of constitutional values.
Defence Minister Rajnath Singh said the Emergency, imposed by the then-prime minister Indira Gandhi in 1975 before she lifted it in 1977 and called for elections, is a black chapter in Indian democracy which cannot be forgotten.
The BJP leaders' statements come amid a coordinated campaign by opposition parties to paint the government led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi as working against the Constitution. The Congress and other opposition members carried copies of the Constitution in Parliament on Monday as the first session of the 18th Lok Sabha began to highlight the campaign.
The first day of the 18th Lok Sabha on Monday witnessed a war of words between Prime Minister Modi and Congress chief Mallikarjun Kharge over the imposition of Emergency.
