Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge addresses a press conference at the party headquarters in New Delhi on December 18, 2024.
| Photo Credit: Shiv Kumar Pushpakar
Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge stated on Wednesday that if Prime Minister Narendra Modi holds any respect for B.R. Ambedkar, the architect of the Constitution, he should remove Home Minister Amit Shah from his Cabinet if the Home Minister did not resign on his own.
The Congress stepped up its attack against Mr. Shah’s comment on Ambedkar with the party’s State units taking out protest marches and gheraoing Raj Bhavans across the country to build pressure on the Modi government.
Apart from Mr. Kharge, Trinamool Congress supremo and West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) chief and Tamil Nadu CM M.K. Stalin, Rashtriya Janata Dal leader Tejashwi Yadav and Left leaders also criticised the Home Minister.
Replying to the debate on the Constitiution in the Rajya Sabha on Tuesday, Mr Shah had said that it had become a “fashion to keep repeating Ambedkar’s name but if the Opposition had taken God’s name as many times, they would have got a place in heaven”.
Accusing Mr. Shah of disrespecting the architect of the Constitution, Mr. Kharge said he should apologise to the nation for the “insult” and said that the Home Minister’s comment reflects the mindset of Manusmriti.
“We want Amit Shah to quit his post and, if he doesn’t, I want to tell the Prime Minister that if he has even a little respect for Babasaheb, he should dismiss Amit Shah from his post before midnight,” Mr. Kharge said.
“If there is no resignation, there will be protests all over the country. Babasaheb Ambedkar ji belongs to everyone because he used to talk about every person of society, including the Dalits, the oppressed and the deprived. He had sympathy for everyone,” he added.
The West Bengal Chief Minister alleged that Mr. Shah’s remarks displayed BJP’s “casteist and anti-Dalit mindset”. “If this is how they behave after being reduced to 240 seats, imagine the damage they would’ve inflicted if their dream of 400 seats had been realised. They’d have rewritten history to entirely erase Dr. Ambedkar’s contributions,” Ms. Banerjee posted on X.
In a X post, Mr. Stalin said only those “who commit a lot of sins will have to worry about “punya” (good deeds). “Those who worry about the country, protecting the Constitution and the people will only utter only the name of revolutionary Babasaheb Ambedkar,” he said.
CPI general secretary D. Raja told The Hindu,“The Home Minister should know that as the prime architect of our Constitution, Ambedkar’s name will always be taken with respect. Why has Mr. Shah linked Ambedkar to religion?”
“BJP leaders should hear this loud and clear, Babasaheb Ambedkar is our fashion, passion, inspiration and motivation as well,” Tejashwi Yadav stated.
Published – December 18, 2024 08:57 pm IST
