GUWAHATI: Launching a blistering attack on the Congress, BJP president Amit Shah said Sunday that the opposition party cannot “nurture” the country’s democracy and for it only “family matters”.
Naming Congress leaders from the Nehru-Gandhi family, Shah claimed that the oldest party of the country does not have “internal” democracy.
“Jawaharlal Nehru, Indira Gandhi, Sanjay Gandhi, Rajiv Gandhi, Sonia Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi — I am not mentioning the future name. No question of involving workers at all. Such parties cannot nurture the country’s democracy and fulfil its objectives,” the BJP chief said at a party meet here.
Taking a dig at the Congress, he said the party, which does not have “internal democracy”, cannot strengthen the country’s democracy.
“That is why, only one family ruled the country for 55 years… Nehru-Gandhi family of the Congress ruled these 55 years. But what has the country got?” Shah said.
Laying the foundation stone of a nine-storey building that will house the new state headquarters of the BJP in Assam, Shah, in an apparent dig at the Congress, said that “brain, hard work, patriotism do not matter, only family matters”.
Stating that such practices are not prevalent in the BJP, he cited his own example, explaining how he rose to the position of national president from a booth worker who put up posters in 1982.
“Our democracy is the biggest in the world. Born in a poor tea seller’s house, (prime minister) Narendra Modi is the leader of the world’s biggest democracy,” he said.
Shah said many political parties across India are working in different ways in the democratic system, but the BJP is different from all as it has preserved its internal democracy even today.
“In every three years, we conduct elections from booth level to that of the national president. That is why the BJP has not become any family party, but remains a party of workers only. BJP has become a national party, not a regional party. It never got split after poll results.
“Father, son or daughter, son-in-law, these things never happen in the BJP. Many parties are just family parties,” he said.
Shah claimed that when Modi got the mandate to form government, 60 crore people did not have bank accounts, 18 crore had no gas cylinders, 10 crore were without houses, 2.5 crore had no electricity and 10 crore were bereft of toilets at homes.
The BJP chief said the Modi government has worked to solve these issues.
“We have to win the 2019 elections not for the BJP, but for the development of India and Assam,” he said. PTI
