Vande Mataram row: Cong slams Nitin Nabin over remarks against Rahul Gandhi, BJP backs party chief

New Delhi, Sep 10 (IANS) The Congress on Thursday criticised Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) President Nitin Nabin over the latter’s remarks aimed at Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi, regarding rendition of the national song Vande Mataram, while the BJP backed its party chief.

Addressing BJP workers in Uttarakhand’s Haldwani a day earlier, the BJP chief referred to the LoP as “Rahul Mian” and accused him of failing to understand the significance of India’s culture and the national song.

He said: “Rahul cannot appreciate the national song’s significance as he was raised in a ‘foreign culture’. He is unable to grasp the importance of Indian culture.”

Nabin alleged that an “anti-national and anarchic” mindset is driving the Congress.

Reacting to it, Congress leader Amar Singh asked the BJP chief to “study the history of the national song”.

“It was the Congress Working Committee which passed the ‘Vande Mataram’ in 1936,” he told IANS while accusing the RSS of not hoisting the Tricolour at its headquarters for 52 years.

Notably, in October 1937, the Congress Working Committee adopted a historic resolution recommending that only the first two stanzas of Vande Mataram be sung at national gatherings.

Amar Singh further attacked the BJP, saying: “They only want to politicise everything…now they have made a law because their government is in power. They do not know anything about India’s history and freedom struggle.”

Congress MP Pramod Tiwari added: “When Congress leaders were going to jail, facing torture and being beaten with lathis, his (Nabin’s) so-called main family, the Sangh family, was acting as informers and writing letters to the British.”

Congress spokesperson Surendra Rajput echoed, saying: “Your ancestors informed the British about those who sang the national song.”

“Vande Mataram is in our blood; we don’t have to learn anything from them. We will keep singing the national song,” he told IANS.

However, Bihar BJP President Sanjay Saraogi backed Nabin, calling it the “bitter truth” of the Congress.

Attacking Rahul Gandhi, he said: “You cannot understand the importance of Vande Mataram. You have been educated in a foreign culture, so what would you know?”

Referring to the Independence Day row where senior Congress leader Sonia Gandhi was accused of obstructing the full rendition of the national song, Saraogi said: ‘Vande Mataram,’ which was sung by freedom fighters and our martyrs, is something that your mother, the Congress party and you feel insulted by singing.”

“They are insulting the freedom fighters for ‘vote bank politics’, for votes of the Muslims,” he told IANS.

BJP MLA Ram Kadam said: “The Congress is insulting the national song and also tarnishing India’s image abroad. So, what need does the country have for such a Congress party? It is better if it ceases to exist. And they are gradually fading away due to their own actions.”

–IANS

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