PM insulted people of Karnataka, must apologise: Congress
New Delhi, May 4: The Congress on Friday accused Prime Minister Narendra Modi of insulting the city of Bengaluru and the people of Karnataka through his remarks during campaigning and sought an apology from him.
Congress spokesperson Abhishek Manu Singhvi said that the Prime Minister had heaped a "special insult" on Bengaluru and its citizens by calling it a "city of sins" and "city of garbage".
"He (Modi) has insulted the people of Karnataka, insulted its entrepreneurs, IT technologists by labelling the city, which is known as India's Silicon Valley, as 'valley of sin'," Singhvi said.
"A city and a state which symbolises development, aspirations, youth, opportunities, has been reduced to city of sins. This is a special insult that the Prime Minister has heaped upon Bengaluru and people of Karnataka," he added.
Prime Minister Modi, while addressing a rally in Bengaluru on Thursday, had accused the state's Congress government of having reduced Bengaluru to a valley of sins from Silicon Valley, and added that the city had been changed from a garden city to garbage city, from computer city to crime city, and from a start-up hub to a pothole club.
Taking strong exception to Modi's remarks, Singhvi said that the remarks and the language used were "totally unbefitting of a Prime Minister".
"While terming it as ‘city of sin', the Prime Minister totally ignored that ‘S' stands for superior, ‘I' stands for information technology and ‘N' stands for novelty. This is what Bengaluru is. It's the real start-up hub," Singhvi said.
"But Modi only finds sin in that, and that is deplorable. You don't create jobs, can't stop farmers suicide, you have the lowest agriculture growth rate in a very, very long time and you accuse the Kannadigas of being a valley of sin. It is shameful and country needs an apology which we are never likely to get," the Congress leader said.
Singhvi said that the fear, frustration and follies of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) were growing in the face of an imminent defeat in the upcoming state assembly elections.
He said that Modi also made "false and superficial statements" regarding former Indian Army chiefs General K.M. Cariappa and General K.S. Thimayya - both Kannadigas - which proved his "lack of grasp of history" and "incapacity of his army of researchers to feed him correct information".
In an election rally in Karnataka, Modi on Thursday claimed that after the 1948 India-Pakistan war, General Thimayya was insulted by then Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru and Defence Minister Krishna Menon.
However, the Congress pointed out that in 1948 General Thimayya was not the chief of the Indian Army nor was Krishna Menon the Defence Minister.
Let the Truth be known. If you read VB and like VB, please be a VB Supporter and Help us deliver the Truth to one and all.
Sharad Pawar praised RSS after seeing how it burst fake narrative balloon of LS polls: Fadnavis
Nagpur, Jan 10: Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis on Friday said NCP (SP) chief Sharad Pawar praised the RSS after realising how the outfit managed to overcome the fake narrative spread by the opposition in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.
The opposition had claimed BJP wanted to win 400 seats to change the Constitution and end reservations, a narrative which BJP leaders later claimed hit the party hard.
On Pawar praising the RSS recently, the CM said the MVA was successful in creating a fake narrative during the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.
"When assembly polls were approaching, many people from diverse fields who are inspired by the RSS played their role and burst the balloon of this fake narrative. Sharad Pawar saheb is very intelligent. He would have certainly studied this aspect. He realised that this (RSS) is not a regular political power but a nationalist power. In any competition it is good to praise others," he added.
That is why Pawar may have praised the RSS, Fadnavis said.
Speaking at an interaction with senior editor Vivek Ghalsasi at Late Vilasji Fadnis Jivhala programme here, Fadnavis also said he had asked for organisational work when Eknath Shinde was made chief minister in June 2022, but senior leaders asked him to join the government.
He also said Prime Minister Narendra Modi asked him not to behave like an extra-constitutional authority in the government.
He said the decision to become deputy chief minister on the command of the party leadership earned him a lot of praise from the cadre.
After the massive mandate the ruling alliance received in the 2024 assembly polls, Fadnavis said people and party workers would not have been happy if the CM was not from the BJP.
Shinde himself agreed within minutes that the CM must be from the BJP, which itself got 132 seats and was close to a majority of its own in the 288-member assembly, he added.
On Shiv Sena (UBT) chief Uddhav Thackeray meeting him during the winter sessions of the legislature in Nagpur, Fadnavis said he had announced he would not indulge in politics of revenge after becoming CM and all leaders responded positively to it.
On chances of the NCP (SP) and NCP coming closer or reuniting, Fadnavis said, "If you see the developments that took place from 2019 to 2024, I realised never say never and anything can happen. Uddhav Thackeray goes to some other party and Ajit Pawar comes to us. In politics anything can happen though I am not saying this should happen."
He praised BJP leader Arun Gujarati from whom he learnt patience, which he claimed was an important quality in politics along with the ability to take criticism.
In a lighter vein, he said, "I only get angry when I am hungry. If you see me angry then give me something to eat and my anger will go away."
