New Delhi : The war of words over ‘Constitution’ and ‘Emergency’ intensified between the Congress and the BJP after a miffed main opposition party hit back at the Centre’s decision to observe June 25 every year as “Samvidhaan Hatya Divas.”
A recent reference to the June 25, 1975 Emergency imposed by then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi in the special address to Parliament by President Droupadi Murmu and later by Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla and PM Modi had created a huge political storm with the Congress blaming the ruling NDA of trying to dig up old controversies to cover up its administrative failures and deflect public attention from current burning issues like unemployment and price rise.
The controversy resurfaced on Friday after a home ministry notification mentioned that June 25 would be observed as “Samvidhaan Hatya Divas” every year to highlight the dark chapter of Indian democracy.
“I am surprised that a fifty-year-old incident is being recalled to deflect public attention from the burning issues of the day like unemployment and price rise and the Chinese incursions on our borders. After the Emergency, there have been several national election mandates but it is also true that the Constitution has been strangled daily since 2014 when the Modi government came to power. I think the past decade should actually be remembered as ‘Samvidhaan Hatya Yug instead,” Rajya Sabha member Pramod Tewari told ETV Bharat.
Senior Congress leader and Lok Sabha MP Manickam Tagore member the Centre’s move was a diversionary tactic.
“We all know that the BJP is rattled over the ‘Jai Samvidhaan’ campaign of the Congress party. Earlier, when we had named the opposition alliance as INDIA, they had started flagging the use of the term Bharat instead. Now, as we pursue the ‘Jai Samvidhaan’ campaign, they are again trying to divert public attention from high unemployment and price rise,” Tagore told ETV Bharat.
“During the national elections, our leader Rahul Gandhi led a ‘Save Constitution’ campaign which turned away the Dalit voters and hit the BJP hard. Now they are resorting to such tactics to defame us. But the voters can see everything,” he said.
The Congress leader was referring to a plan to highlight the Constitution and its role in the eight states that will go to polls over the next 20 months including Maharashtra, Haryana, Jharkhand, UT Jammu and Kashmir, Delhi, West Bengal, Bihar and Tamil Nadu.
According to AICC secretary BM Sandeep Kumar, "no one was saying that the Emergency was good but it had been introduced under serious threat to the then elected government from the opposition." Further, Kumar said that "the move itself was provided for by the Constitution and was replaced with normal elections in 1977."
After the Speaker’s resolution on Emergency in the House, Leader of the Opposition Rahul Gandhi had led an INDIA bloc delegation to express their disappointment over the issue with the Chair.
During the elections the opposition had alleged that the Constitution and constitutional agencies were being misused by the NDA government which had unleashed an ‘undeclared emergency’ over the past decade.
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1. June 25 to Be Observed As Samvidhaan Hatya Diwas To Mark 'Horrors of Emergency': Amit Shah
