Senior Congress leader and former Chairperson of the Legislative Council B.K. Chandrashekar said here on Thursday that unemployment and polarisation in society on communal lines were affecting the middle class which was raising its voice against it.
Speaking to mediapersons, Prof. Chandrashekar said that the COVID-19 pandemic left more than 10 million people jobless in the country, and this was over and above 30 million youths who were unemployed before the onset of the pandemic. Yet the government has remained silent on such critical issues..
However, the middle class people were raising their voice on issues that were affecting them and this included the growing polarisation in society, he said.
Taking a dig at Mr. Modi’s remarks that the Indian diaspora in Germany was representative of unity in diversity, the Congress leader said back home the Prime Minister was not allowing the concept to prevail.
Expressing concern that the ideology of Hindutva espoused by the BJP was now entering the realm of education and culture, he said the remarks of some Union Ministers in the recent past were reminiscent of the views held by Adolf Hitler and racial in nature. In the BJP-ruled States the Chief Ministers had little freedom to deviate from the Hindutva ideology, said Prof. Chandrashekar who described Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai as a sober man but ‘forced’ to implement the Hindutva policies
Bhagavad Gita
On the issue of introducing Bhagavad Gita in schools, Prof. Chandrashekar said he was not opposed to it but texts of other religions too should be taught. However, to describe Bhagavad Gita as a moral text ignoring its religious aspects in a bid to introduce it in school curriculum to the exclusion of other religious texts was not correct.. ’I am extending an invitation to BJP leaders for an informed and a friendly discussion on the subject’’, he added.
The Congress leader also took exception to the appointment of a retired bureaucrat as the new Information Commissioner on the grounds that he was chargesheeted by the Lokayuta.
