Hitting back at Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s recent statements about the Congress under Jawaharlal Nehru allegedly being responsible for delaying Goa’s liberation from the Portuguese rule, Congress MP Rahul Gandhi on Friday said Mr. Modi did not understand history and was distracting the Goan people ahead of the election to hide the failures of the ruling BJP government.
Speaking in Margao in South Goa on the last day of campaigning, Mr. Gandhi censured Mr. Modi for his remarks during a rally in Mapusa that if then PM Jawaharlal Nehru had so wanted, then Goa could have been liberated “within hours” in 1947 when the rest of India became Independent.Mr. Modi had further alleged the Nehru-led Congress government of ‘destroying’ Goa’s liberation movement that was fighting to shake-off Portuguese yoke.
“This issue [Goa’s Liberation] has been commented on by freedom fighters and academics before…the sad fact is that the Prime Minister doesn’t quite understand history. He doesn’t understand in detail on what was going on post-World War II,” said Mr. Gandhi.
Remarking that every party had a particular role, he took potshots at Mr. Modi by stating that the PM’s ‘role’ today was to divert the attention of Goans from pressing matters.
“I see my role today in ensuring that Goa gets a government that represents its voice. The Prime Minister also has a role… since he cannot come to you [the Goan public] today and say I gave you jobs, employment, fixed your problems, stole your last government, so his role has been to distract people and divert their attention from the main issues afflicting Goans,” said the former Congress president.
On a day-long tour of the coastal State which goes to polls on February 14, Mr. Gandhi, addressing a public rally in Curtorim assured the electorate that the Congress would “safeguard Goa’s composite culture, its secularism and its different histories”.
“We are a party for all religions, castes and communities… The biggest challenge facing Goa today is economic. The State faces an economic disaster because of the BJP’s mismanagement. The Congress will try to get Goa back on the tracks,” he said.
Promising a government that would be consultative in nature, Mr. Gandhi further said the Congress had followed the wishes of the Goan people and had not given any tickets to defectors and had fielded fresh faces.
“We are following the directions of the people of Goa and will run a government in partnership with them to take Goa forward… the smaller parties are incapable of achieving majority. The Congress will do so and form a government immediately,” he assured.
Former Curtorim MLA Aleixo Reginaldo Lourenco, an ex-Congressman had defected to the Trinamool Congress in December last year despite the Congress announcing his name in its first list of eight candidates. Though Mr. Lourenco deserted the TMC after a few weeks, the Congress has refused to re-admit him in keeping with the party’s hardline on defectors.
