Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot
Credit: PTI Photo
Rajasthan chief minister Ashok Gehlot on Monday accused Narendra Modi of harbouring the “dangerous” illusion that he is the prime minister of just the BJP and the Hindus.
Addressing a public event here, the Congress leader took swipes at Modi over his “expensive” clothes, and set himself as a bigger “faqir”, or an ascetic, than the prime minister.
The Congress leader also appeared to pitch himself as his party’s next chief ministerial choice, saying he has thought about leaving the CM’s post, but the post wouldn’t leave him.
The chief minister said Modi gets respect abroad only because people there know that he is from Mahatma Gandhi's country, where democracy and the rule of the ballot have been “kept alive by the Congress”.
“The prime minister is under the illusion that he is the prime minister of the BJP. His behaviour, speech and body language are as if he is the prime minister of a party, he is the prime minister of Hindus only,” the chief minister said. “This is a very dangerous thing,” he added.
He said Modi has been elected in a democracy in which the Congress had maintained the rule of the ballot.
“Why does Modi consider himself the prime minister of the BJP and Hindus?” he said.
It is said Modi has become a big world leader, Gehlot told the gathering. He then asked people to find out what the world thinks about the violence in Manipur.
He objected to Modi mentioning the Congress-ruled states of Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh while commenting on the video that showed two Manipur women being paraded naked by a mob.
Gehlot called the comparison an “insult”.
Modi had condemned crime against women, mentioning BJP-run Manipur and the two other states in the same breath. Gehlot said the answer to violence cannot be violence.
“Do Modi's party and the RSS people understand this? Tagore, whom they believe in, had said that humanity is greater than nationality. If there is no love, where will the nation be,” the CM asked.
Taking a dig at the PM, he said if Modi is an ascetic, he is a bigger one.
Gehlot claimed Modi does not repeat his clothes while he wears the same ones.
”Am I not a fakir?” he asked at the event to mark the foundation of new districts in the state.
“I have not bought a plot in my life, not bought a flat. I have not bought a single gram of gold. Can he be a bigger faqir than me? Modi's spectacles cost Rs 2.5 lakhs.”
He said the BJP was projecting Modi’s face for the assembly elections, and asked if the PM would come to Rajasthan to set up new tehsils and colleges, or to appoint a sub divisional magistrate?
The CM said he is not arrogant “like Modi” and has done much work for public welfare, and will go to the polls on the basis of that work.
Gehlot again claimed that Union minister Gajendra Singh Shekhawat and his family members are involved in the Sanjivani Credit Cooperative Society scam -- an allegation over which he is facing a defamation case in a Delhi court.
The CM said that he appeared in that court through video conferencing today. He said he cancelled his trip to Phalodi, one of the new districts, because of the court hearing.
17 new districts and three divisions came into being in Rajasthan on Monday with Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot virtually unveiling inauguration plaques and participating in a yajna in Jaipur.
With this, Rajasthan now has 50 districts and 10 divisions.