Rahul asserts Congress is Muslims’ party; Another self-goal?

New Delhi, July 14: Stung by the ever increasing popularity of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and withering of party’s traditional vote bank, Congress President Rahul Gandhi seems to have adopted the original track of the party i.e. appeasement of Muslims.

His recent visit and interaction with the Muslim intellectuals should be seen as part of this exercise to win back the ‘lost sheep’.

Notwithstanding the oft frequented allegation of Muslim appeasement, Rahul Gandhi asserted that the “Congress is Muslims’ Party”. He justified his statement on the plea that Muslims of the country are weak and the Congress always stood for weaker sections of the society.

It is not a mere coincidence that senior Congress leader Shashi Tharoor comes out with the theory of ‘Hindu Pakistan’ if Narendra Modi and BJP won the 2019 elections and former Vice President Hamid Ansari supporting Sharia courts under the plea that “each community has right to practice own personal law”.

It is a well thought out plan of the Congress party to drive wedge into the Hindus and Muslims of this country to grab the power. Any political party would vie for power and there is nothing wrong in their pursuit of power. But to achieve the mission, they are and should not be allowed to play with the unity, integrity and sovereignty of the nation. Congress is doing exactly that.

Remember, the then Prime Minister Man Mohan Singh had said that the minorities (read Muslims) have the first right to the resources of the nation. Why this, even during the freedom struggle, the Congress had always adopted the appeasement policy towards the Muslims and finally accepted the vivisection of the motherland to appease them. The party did not hesitate to sign the instrument of partition and dub it as instrument of independence.

People believed in Congress, they believed in the leadership of Mahatma Gandhi, Pt Nehru, Sardar Patel, Lal Bahadur Shastri and others. But now they have understood the Congress game plan. In fact, the common voter had seen through the Congress game plan in 2014 and gave a crushing defeat to the party.

Now with an eye on 2019 elections, the Congress is once again trying to placate the Muslim community. The party had tried to woe Hindu voters by adopting a soft approach towards Hindutva, donning ‘janeu’ and visiting temples a la Rahul Gandhi style. But that did twofold damage. It did not bring sufficient Hindu votes to the party’s kitty and it further alienated the party’s traditional Muslim vote bank.

To gain the confidence of the Muslims, the Congress is once again trying to prove that it is most loyal than the master. The meeting between Rahul Gandhi and Muslim intellectuals on political scenario at his residence at 12 Tughlaq Lane should be seen from this angle.

He pledged his and his mother’s commitment to give Muslims their due rights and said ‘we cannot compromise on it’.

Congress had a history of acting against the interests of the country and its people. The same Congress under Rahul’s great grandfather Pt Nehru had distributed party tickets in first general elections in 1952 to those Muslims who voiced for creation of Pakistan but did not migrate there and stayed back after the 1947 partition. Perhaps, Rahul Gandhi, Shashi Tharoor, Digvijay Singh and Hamid Ansari and many more Congress leaders should study this before making such comments.

And, if as per Rahul’s assertion if the Congress is a Muslims’ party what about those hundreds of Hindu leaders in the Congress? If they have self-respect and self-pride, they should question Rahul’s political wisdom in making such a declaration. They know for sure that they are not going to get the desired support from the Muslim community hereafter.

With one masterstroke on triple talaq the Modi government succeeded in winning over the sympathy of nearly 8-9 crore Muslim women to his party. The Muslim men have also understood that they were being used by the Congress party as pawns in their game of political power. It may be possible that they would not side with the BJP cent percent but a sizeable percentage of them might support the BJP and Narendra Modi’s leadership.

So, another self-goal by the Congress President?