Rahul Gandhi, the leader of the Congress, said that the primary architects of modern India were all Non-Resident Indians (NRIs) who had an open mind to the outside world when speaking to the Indian Diaspora in New York on Monday.
The Congressman, who is wrapping up a three-city tour of the US, claimed that all notable figures involved in the nation’s freedom struggle, such as Mahatma Gandhi, BR Ambedkar, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, Jawaharlal Nehru, and Subhash Chandra Bose, were NRIs with a positive outlook on the outside world.
Mahatma Gandhi, the main designer of contemporary India, was an NRI. Nehru, BR Ambedkar, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, and Subhash Chandra Bose, all of whom were NRIs and had an open attitude towards the outside world, set the groundwork for India’s freedom movement in South Africa, he claimed.
His comment has relevance because the BJP, which currently controls the Centre, has frequently accused him of damaging India’s reputation abroad.
The saffron party has also claimed that there is a bigger worldwide conspiracy to malign India.
The Congressman claimed the country is in a struggle between two ideologies: one promoted by the Congress and the other by the BJP and Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), the saffron party’s ideological parent.
The Congressman asserted that “there is a battle going on in India between two ideologies—one that we (the Congress) represent and another that is promoted by the BJP and the RSS.”
He continued by saying that Mahatma Gandhi, the Father of the Nation, had the same values and ideology as the Congress.
He asserted that the ideologies advanced and spread by the BJP and RSS were those of Nathuram Godse, a right-wing figure who murdered Mahatma Gandhi.
“The ideology that we follow is the ideology of the Mahatma Gandhi, an NRI and a kind and a simple man who propagated non-violence and had a lifelong quest for the truth. However, the ideology that BJP and RSS follow is that of Nathuram Godse, a violent and angry man unable to face the reality of his own life,” Rahul claimed.
