Narendra Modi attributed false statements to me, engaged in hate speech, says Manmohan Singh
The former prime minister urged the voters of Punjab to choose ‘development and coordinated progress’ that he said only the Congress can guarantee.
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Former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Thursday stated that his successor Narendra Modi had attributed false statements to him and engaged in the most vicious form of hate speech during campaigning for the ongoing Lok Sabha elections.
“I have never in my life singled out one community from the other,” said Singh in a letter addressed to the people of Punjab, where the general elections are scheduled for June 1. “That is the sole copyright of the BJP [Bharatiya Janata Party].”
The former prime minister seemed to be responding to Modi having quoted his remarks to falsely claim in poll rallies that the Congress would distribute citizens’ private wealth among “infiltrators” and “those who have more children” if voted to power, a dog-whistle reference to Muslims.
Modi made the claim during a speech in Rajasthan’s Banswara on April 21, during which he purportedly referred to remarks that the former prime minister made on December 9, 2006 at a meeting of the National Development Council.
Singh had said that the country’s priorities were to uplift the Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, Other Backward Classes, minorities and women and children.
“We will have to devise innovative plans to ensure that minorities, particularly the Muslim minority, are empowered to share equitably in the fruits of development,”...
