Jabalpur, Nov 26 (PTI): Prime Minister Narendra Modi slammed the Congress Sunday for dragging his parents into a political slugfest, alleging that it was being done at the behest of party chief Rahul Gandhi.
Calling the Congress a "burden on the nation", he also justified his own tirade against the Nehru-Gandhi family, pointing out that unlike his parents, they occupied top positions in politics and the government. Congress leaders have kicked up a controversy recently by first comparing the falling value of the rupee to the advanced age of Modi's mother and then claiming that the father of the prime minister was not someone illustrious.
"What has happened to the Congress party? The 'naamdar' (dynast, referring to Rahul Gandhi) is tacitly supporting it and therefore, its leaders are dragging the name of my father, who passed away 30 years ago," Modi said, addressing a rally here in poll-bound Madhya Pradesh. "The Congress is running out of steam in this election, so they have started dragging my parents into politics. No Congressman would make such a statement against me or my family without the consent of the party president. It is the 'naamdar' who is making his leaders speak against me," he added.
"My mother sits in her house, performing religious rites, confining herself to a room, and has never visited Madhya Pradesh. She does not even know the 'R' of 'rajneeti' (politics)," Modi said.
"Yesterday, they took the name of my mother and now my father. The Congress chief is behind this...," he alleged. "Hundred generations of my family have no links with politics. We lived in a small village....lived like the poor. "And the naamdar says, Modiji is also speaking against my family'," the prime minister said.
"Naamdar, I do not talk about your family members. I talk about former prime ministers, former Congress leaders. I speak against former Congress leaders, seeking an account of their work. "Yes, I have to take their names as they were in politics, unlike my family members, who sit quietly in their home and do their job," he added.
"You throw questions at Modi, (then) just as Modi is accountable, your family too is answerable," the prime minister said. The opposition party was left with no issues and was, therefore, indulging in this kind of abusive rhetoric, he added.
The previous Congress-led United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government had introduced a crop loan waiver scheme in 2008, but of the Rs 6-lakh crore agricultural debt, loans of only Rs 60,000 crore were waived, Modi claimed. Former Union minister Vilas Muttemwar made a controversial statement at a Congress meeting in Rajasthan Saturday, saying nobody knew "the name of your (Modi's) father but everyone knows the name of Rahul Gandhi's father".
Before that, Uttar Pradesh Congress chief Raj Babbar had compared the falling value of the rupee to the advanced age of Modi's mother. At Vidisha, Modi also mentioned his cabinet colleague and local MP Sushma Swaraj, lauding her for ensuring the development of the constituency, despite facing health issues.
Speaking at a rally in Jabalpur later, he alleged that of the last 15 years under Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, "10 years were lost because the government of Madam (UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi) put hurdles in the way of development".
"You have to decide. One mistake will take you back to the age of misgovernance when there was no power, the roads were broken, the education system was pathetic due to the absence of schools and the health services were poor," Modi said.
The Congress, which had lost elections in states after states, "has become a burden on the nation", he added. "...they (Congress) are unable to decide who will be their leader in Madhya Pradesh....There is a courtier (apparently referring to state Congress chief Kamal Nath), a raja (Digvijay Singh) and a maharaja (Jyotiraditya Scindia). None of them will become the chief minister," Modi asserted.
In a jibe at Rahul Gandhi, who has promised to make Madhya Pradesh a hub of mobile phone production if the Congress is voted to power in the state, the prime minister said there were only two mobile factories in the country in 2014, while now there were 125, ensuring the availability of low-cost smartphones.
Modi also said Jabalpur would emerge as a major defence production centre, adding that the earlier governments were more interested in buying weapons as that served their purposes. The 230-member Madhya Pradesh Assembly will go to the polls on November 28 and the results will be announced on December 11.