Minister for Primary and Secondary Education B.C. Nagesh on Friday denied showing disrespect to the national flag.
Fielding reporters queries on the complaint lodged against him by the Youth Congress in Tiptur, Mr. Nagesh said he was holding the national flag and the photographs and videos appearing in the mainstream media would hold a mirror to the truth.
He accused the Congress of using a distorted photograph to lodge a complaint against him. “What I was holding was the national flag. I don’t know what was behind me,” he said. He also claimed that the Congress leaders did not even know the colours of the national flag properly.
Reacting to former Chief Minister Siddaramaiah’s question over the BJP’s contribution to the country’s independence, Mr. Nagesh said the Congress that participated in the freedom movement was different from the present-day Congress. Though Mahatma Gandhi had said that the Congress be dissolved after the country’s independence, a few people retained the party for their selfish and political purposes.
While leaders of the pre-Independence Congress went to jail for the sake of the country’s freedom, no leader of the present-day Congress had either participated in the freedom struggle or sent to jail. “The present-day Congress leaders had gone to jail for different reasons that I don’t want to spell out,” he said.
He also claimed that several BJP leaders had been jailed when “freedom” was snatched from the people of the country during the Emergency.
