Priyanka and I were not happy after Prabhakaran was killed: Rahul Gandhi
Hamburg (Germany), Aug 23: Congress President Rahul Gandhi on Wednesday said he and his sister Priyanka Gandhi Vadra were not happy after his father's (Rajiv Gandhi) killer, LTTE chief Prabhakaran was killed, as they felt "the violence inflicted upon him had impacted others, including his children".
While addressing a gathering at Bucerius Summer School here, Gandhi said he lost two members of his family due to violence.
"My grandmother (Indira Gandhi) and my father (Rajiv Gandhi) were both killed. So, I have suffered violence. I am talking actually from experience. The only way you can move forward after violence is forgiveness. There is no other way. And to forgive you have to understand what exactly happened and why it happened."
He said: "To deal with it is to actually listen and act non-violently. People think this is weakness. But, in fact this is strength. My father was killed by a terrorist in 1991. In 2009, I saw the person who killed my father lying in a field in Sri Lanka.
He went on to say: "I called up my sister Priyanka and said that this is very strange, but I am not happy. I should be celebrating that the person who is dead is the person who killed my father. But somehow I am not happy. She said: 'you are right, I am not happy either'."
"The reason I wasn't happy was because I saw myself in his children. So, I realised, him lying there actually means that there are kids like me who are crying," he added.
"He might have been a bad or an evil person, but the violence that was done against him was impacting others, like it had impacted me. If you go deep, you will find there is something that triggered that violence. It's not just a random event. Some action or violence done against him or her has triggered it," he also added.
Indira Gandhi was shot dead by two of her bodyguards at her official residence here on October 31, 1984 while a suicide bomber from Sri Lanka's now vanquished Tamil Tigers group blew up Rajiv Gandhi at an election rally in Tamil Nadu on May 21, 1991.
Sri Lankan security forces shot dead Prabhakaran and virtually destroyed the Tamil Tigers in May 2009, ending a quarter century of separatist war in the island nation.
He also said that the only way one can fight violence is by non-violence. "There is no other way. You might be under the illusion that you can fight violence with violence, but it will come back. You might think that you are very powerful and that you can subdue somebody else, but they will find a way of coming back."
"Violence is being cause because of a certain anger inside. Until you understand and remove the anger, it is going to remain there. You can't fight violence with more violence."
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Bengal polls: Mamata Banerjee backs Jyotipriya Mallick as TMC's candidate from Habra
Habra (WB) (PTI): West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Tuesday extended her full support to long-time political associate Jyotipriya Mallick, claiming he was targeted in a money laundering case due to a CPI(M) conspiracy.
Mallick, who held the Food and Supplies portfolio in the Mamata Banerjee government from 2011 to 2021, was arrested by the ED in October 2023 in a money laundering case linked to an alleged multi-crore ration distribution scam.
He was granted bail in January 2025. At the time of his arrest, he was the state’s forest minister.
Extending her full support to Mallick, who is contesting from Habra constituency for a fourth consecutive term, Banerjee claimed that the CPI(M) and the BJP were spreading canards against him.
"Nobody has worked as well as Balu (Mallick) did in my government," Banerjee said, adding that he was arrested out of "jealousy".
The chief minister alleged that CPI(M) entered 1.5 crore false names in the PDS ration list, which Mallick detected and removed.
She also claimed the Left party persuaded the BJP to register the case against him.
"Balu was instrumental in providing digital ration cards to beneficiaries and introduced a system to track vehicles transporting PDS goods," Banerjee said.
She also defended her nephew and TMC MP Abhishek Banerjee, questioning why honest business earnings were being scrutinised.
Addressing voters ahead of the two-phase Assembly polls, she said, "I am the candidate everywhere. One vote for Trinamool means voting for me. If you want development work to continue under my leadership, exercise your franchise with my face in mind."
Training her guns on the CPI(M), Banerjee asserted that the Left party drew a blank in the elections because of her.
The CPI(M)-led Left Front could not win a single seat in the 2021 Assembly elections, and also in the 2019 and 2024 Lok Sabha polls in Bengal.
"ED or CBI cases are not registered against CPI(M), because they play got-up games with the BJP," the TMC chief said.
Banerjee claimed that the CPI(M) candidates, by dividing votes, will try to help the BJP win seats, asserting that anti-BJP votes should go only to the TMC.
She said people were made to stand in long queues for SIR and asked voters, "Will you avenge this or not?"
She claimed that former CPI(M) workers and supporters have now shifted allegiance to the BJP, while accusing the saffron party, Left and Congress of being "in cahoots with each other."
"Where were they when SIR was being done?" she asked, asserting that only TMC workers stood by the people during that period.
