Sonia Gandhi targets PM at Cong's Chintan Shivir, says minorities being 'brutalised'
Udaipur(PTI): Congress chief Sonia Gandhi on Friday launched a blistering attack on Prime Minister Narendra Modi, charging that it has become clear that his mantra of 'minimum government, maximum governance' means keeping the country in a permanent state of polarisation, "brutalising" minorities and "threatening" political opponents.
In her inaugural address at the party's 'Chintan Shivir' here, she urged delegates to deliberate with an open mind and send out a clear message of strong organisation and unity.
She said the Shivir is also an occasion to deliberate on the many challenges ahead of us and bring organisational changes.
It is both 'Chintan' about national issues and meaningful 'aatmachintan' (self-introspection) about our party organisation, she said.
Gandhi charged that it has become painfully clear what Prime Minister Modi and his colleagues really meany by their frequently used slogan of maximum governance, minimum government.
It means keeping the country in a permanent state of polarisation, compelling people to stay in a constant state of fear and insecurity. It means viciously targeting, victimising and brutalising minorities who are an integral part of our society and equal citizens of our republic, she charged.
It means using our societies age old pluralities to divide us and subverting a carefully nurtured idea of unity and diversity. It means threatening and intimidating political opponents, maligning their reputation, jailing them on flimsy pretexts using investigative agencies Gandhi further alleged.
She urged party leaders to keep the organisation above personal ambitions, saying the party has given us a lot and it's time to pay back.
Noting that changes in organisation are the need of the hour, she said, We need to change the way of our working .
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Congress using hijab issue to pacify minority anger, alleges Karnataka LoP R Ashoka
Bengaluru: Leader of Opposition in the Assembly R. Ashoka has accused the Congress government of using the hijab issue to placate what he described as discontent among minority voters after the Davanagere by-election.
In a post on X on Wednesday, Ashoka alleged that the state government, instead of addressing issues such as price rise, corruption, farmers’ distress and law and order, was attempting to retain its minority vote base by reviving the hijab issue.
Referring to the 2022 dress code introduced by the BJP government, which prohibited hijab in schools and colleges, Ashoka said the Karnataka High Court had upheld the policy and emphasised the importance of discipline in educational institutions.
He questioned the Congress government’s move to revisit the issue and asked whether setting aside the court-backed policy to benefit one community could be described as secularism.
Ashoka further alleged that while the government was willing to permit hijab, it continued to prohibit saffron shawls.
He accused the government of dividing students on religious lines rather than treating schools and colleges as spaces of equality.
Drawing a comparison with Mamata Banerjee’s government in West Bengal, Ashoka claimed that excessive appeasement politics had harmed the state and warned that the Congress in Karnataka could face a similar political response.
He said voters in Karnataka would teach the Congress a lesson for what he termed “vote-bank politics” and for compromising constitutional and judicial principles.
