Prime Minister Narendra Modi replies to the Motion of Thanks to the President's address in the Rajya Sabha during the Budget session of Parliament, in New Delhi.
Credit: Sansad TV via PTI Photo
New Delhi: Setting the tone for the upcoming state assembly polls, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday accused the Opposition of “insulting the President” by disrupting debate on President Murmu’s address in the Lok Sabha, and targeted Trinamool Congress, in particular, for moving the Supreme Court to defend “infiltrators” who are snatching “jobs and land of the tribals" in the state.
Lauding the recent trade deals with the EU and the US, Modi, while responding to the debate on the Presidential address in the Rajya Sabha, said that India, with “low inflation and high growth,” is rapidly moving towards becoming the third-largest economy and a leading voice of the global south.
Taking potshots at the Congress, Prime Minister Modi said, “Even now, when people speak about them, they don’t talk about the trade deals. They talk about deals like the Bofors.”
Prime Minister Modi further said that his opponents wish for him to land in his grave, but the blessings of the people of India will see him through.
“They cannot digest how Modi has reached this position, and for them there is only one way out, chant “Modi teri kabr khudegi” (Modi, your grave will be dug,” the prime minister said even as the Opposition walked out of the Upper House demanding the Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha, Rahul Gandhi, be permitted to make his speech in the Lower House.
In an apparent reference to West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, who recently appeared before the Supreme Court in the SIR case, Modi sought to know, when people in the most prosperous countries are expelling infiltrators, why “some people want to defend them.”
Moving to another poll-bound state, Assam, the prime minister said his government conferred Bharat Ratna on thespian Bhupen Hazarika, while some in the Opposition opposed it. Drawing the battle lines in Punjab, another state that will go to the polls next year, Modi launched a scathing attack on Congress leader Rahul Gandhi’s remarks calling Union minister Ravneet Singh Bittu a “traitor.”
“Honorable MP was called a traitor because he was a Sikh, and this is a display of the enmity against Sikhs present inside the Congress.” “They insulted a man whose family was martyred for the country. Just because he changed his political ideology,” PM Modi said.
Modi delivered his speech amid sustained sloganeering and a walkout by Opposition members, after he decided to skip the address in the Lok Sabha.
Referring to the slogans raised against him, Modi said, “This is not merely a slogan but shows deep hatred.”
Stating that the country is a force to reckon with in the global south, Modi said India is attractive to the world due to its “youth talent pool”. “The demography of most developed nations is old, but we are a young country with aspirations of the youth,” the PM said.