Congress has long stood with Pak-groomed terrorists: Modi

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday accused the Congress of siding with terrorists groomed by Pakistan instead of supporting the Army, and hailed the Assam Government for “evicting infiltrators from encroached land”.

Modi said he had endured personal attacks and abuses from the Congress, including insults directed at his late mother Heeraben, but as a devotee of Lord Shiva, he would “drink the poison” of abuses and continue to serve the people.

Speaking at a rally in Assam, he said the people of India were his only “remote control” and the only authority before whom he bowed.

Modi recalled the 1962 Chinese aggression and said the scars left on the North-East by former PM Jawaharlal Nehru’s handling of the war had “yet to heal”. He accused the Congress of continuing to “sprinkle salt” on those wounds, betraying Assam’s trust for decades in pursuit of vote bank politics.

The PM alleged that the Congress had long stood with Pakistan-trained terrorists, shielded infiltrators, and had even mocked Assam’s cultural icon Bhupen Hazarika.

“During Operation Sindoor, when our forces destroyed terror bases across the border, the Congress leadership echoed Pakistan’s propaganda instead of backing our Army. They protected infiltrators who seized land, threatened women and girls, and sought to change Assam’s demography. Those days are over,” he said, praising Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma for reclaiming farmland from encroachment.

The PM also brought up Congress’ dismissal of Hazarika when he was awarded the Bharat Ratna. “They mocked it as an honour for ‘singers and dancers’. That insult still hurts the people of Assam,” he said, arguing that the cultural pride of the state had been trampled for years by Delhi’s indifference. Modi took aim at what he called the Congress’ “remote-control politics”, saying the people of India were his only guiding hand. The remark revived his past barbs at Sonia Gandhi, whom he accused of controlling then PM Manmohan Singh, and his recent claims that Mallikarjun Kharge was also being steered by the Gandhi family. “For the Congress, the remote control has always been in one family’s hand. For me, the people of the country are the only remote control,” he said.

Contrasting his government’s record with that of the Congress, Modi said his administration had built six bridges across the Brahmaputra in just 10 years, compared to only three in over six decades under the Congress. He said the “double-engine government” was delivering development that had long been denied to Assam and the wider North-East.

Unveiling projects worth nearly Rs 18,000 crore, Modi inaugurated the 118-km Guwahati Ring Road to ease traffic congestion and improve links with Meghalaya, the Narengi-Kuruwa bridge across the Brahmaputra, and the Darrang Medical College and Hospital along with a new nursing college. Together, he said, these projects would strengthen health services and connectivity for millions of residents.

The centrepiece was the inauguration of India’s first bamboo-based ethanol refinery plant at Numaligarh Refinery Ltd (NRL).

Modi said the plant would guarantee farmers and tribal communities bamboo procurement worth nearly Rs 200 crore every year. “Once bamboo cutting was a crime under the Congress rule. Today, it is empowering Assam,” he said.

The PM also laid the foundation stone for a polypropylene unit at the NRL, expected to manufacture raw material for textiles, packaging, automotive and medical use. He said this would create jobs while diversifying Assam’s industrial base. “Just as Assam is known for its gamosa and Muga silk, it will now also be known for modern textiles made from polypropylene,” he said.

He announced a national deep-sea exploration mission to identify fresh reserves of oil and gas, stressing that Assam’s petroleum wealth remained vital for India’s energy security. He also noted that India had climbed into the world’s top five in solar power production within a decade, alongside ethanol plant and other green energy measures.

Highlighting a Rs 27,000-crore semiconductor plant coming up in Morigaon, Modi said Assam would be central to India’s ambition to be self-reliant in chip manufacturing. “From bank cards to space technology, everything depends on chips. Assam will power India’s future,” he said, adding that this would open new avenues of employment and research in the region.

On welfare, he cited 20 lakh houses built for the poor in Assam, land pattas given to tribal families under Mission Basundhara, and targeted schemes for tea garden workers focusing on healthcare and education for women and children. He said tap water connections had reached millions of households in the state under the Jal Jeevan Mission, lifting the burden of water collection from rural families.

Turning to culture, Modi announced the Maa Kamakhya Corridor project, modelled on the Kashi Vishwanath Dham in Varanasi, which, he said, would boost tourism and enhance facilities for pilgrims. He also mentioned the restoration of the historic Rang Ghar in Sivasagar and the development of Batadrava, the birthplace of Srimanta Sankardev, as a global standard cultural centre.

He said the government had celebrated Lachit Borphukan’s 400th birth anniversary on a national scale and ensured that his biography was translated into 23 Indian languages, so that future generations could draw inspiration from Assam’s legendary general. The PM said Assam’s 13 per cent growth rate was proof that the state had embraced “a new era of development”.