Dallas: Congress leader and Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi on Monday hit out at the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and said that while it “believes that India is one idea, the Congress on the other hand believes that India is a multiplicity of ideas”.
Addressing the Indian diaspora in Dallas, Gandhi said, "We believe that everybody should be allowed to participate, allowed to dream, and given space regardless of their caste, language, religion, tradition or history.”
Stating that the 2024 general election was a huge setback for the BJP, he said, "We saw that immediately, within minutes of the election result, nobody in India was scared of the BJP or the Prime Minister of India. So these are huge achievements, not of Rahul Gandhi or the Congress party."
"These are huge achievements of the people of India who realised democracy, of the people of India who realised that we are not going to accept an attack on our Constitution. We are not going to accept an attack on our religion, on our state," he added.
Gandhi said that the fight was crystallised in the election when millions of people in India clearly understood that Prime Minister Modi was attacking the Constitution.
"Every single word that I have said to you is in the Constitution. The foundation of modern India is the Constitution. What people understood in the election clearly, and I saw it happening when I used to raise the Constitution, people understood what I was saying. They were saying that the BJP is attacking our tradition, attacking our language, attacking our states, attacking our histories," the Raebareli MP said.
"In my first speech in Parliament, you must have noticed ,when I describe ‘Abhaya Mudra’, the fact that this is a symbol of fearlessness and it is present in every single Indian religion. When I was saying this, the BJP could not stand it. They don't understand, and we are going to make them understand," Gandhi said.
Hailing the Indian diaspora, Gandhi said, "You are the people who have come from India, and the values I have been describing — values of the Constitution, values of respect, values of humility — you carry in your hearts; they are in your blood. When you came to this country, you didn’t come with arrogance, but with humility. You didn’t come with hatred, but with love and affection. You didn’t arrive with disrespect, thinking, 'We came to America, who are these people? We will show them.' No, you came with respect. In your hearts are respect, love, and humility".
He termed them as the ambassadors who were a bridge between these two unions — the United States of America and the Union of States, as written in India's Constitution.
The former Congress president is on a three day visit to the United States.