PM Modi leads BJP's offensive to counter Opposition's Constitution narrative on 1975 Emergency anniversary

Aditi Tandon

New Delhi, June 25

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday flagged the dark days of Emergency to attack opposition Congress as anti-Constitution with the BJP top brass launching a nationwide offensive on the issue and demanding an apology from their political rivals.

“Today is a day to pay homage to all those great men and women who resisted the Emergency. The #DarkDaysOfEmergency remind us of how the Congress Party subverted basic freedoms and trampled over the Constitution of India which every Indian respects greatly,” Modi said, adding that a party that suspended all freedoms had no right to speak of the Constitution.

The prime minister said, “Just to cling on to power, the then Congress Government disregarded every democratic principle and made the nation into a jail. Any person who disagreed with the Congress was tortured and harassed. Socially regressive policies were unleashed to target the weakest sections.”

Attacking the Congress leaders who have been accusing the government of undermining the Constitution, the PM said “Those who imposed the Emergency have no right to profess their love for our Constitution. These are the same people who have imposed Article 356 on innumerable occasions, got a Bill to destroy press freedom, destroyed federalism and violated every aspect of the Constitution.”

Today is a day to pay homage to all those great men and women who resisted the Emergency.

The #DarkDaysOfEmergency remind us of how the Congress Party subverted basic freedoms and trampled over the Constitution of India which every Indian respects greatly.

— Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) June 25, 2024

He said the mindset which led to the imposition of the Emergency is very much alive among the same Party which imposed it.

“They hide their disdain for the Constitution through their tokenism but the people of India have seen through their antics and that is why they have rejected them time and again,” the PM said.

Union Home Minister Amit Shah said the Congress has a long history of killing democracy and repeatedly attacking it.

“The Emergency imposed by Congress on this day in 1975 is the biggest example of this. The arrogant, autocratic Congress government had suspended all kinds of civil rights in the country for 21 months for the sake of power of one family.

“During this period, they had imposed censorship on the media, made changes in the Constitution and tied the hands of even the court. I salute the struggle of countless satyagrahis, social workers, workers, farmers, youth and women who protested from Parliament to the streets against the Emergency.”

BJP president J P Nadda said on ‘X’ that those who claim to be the guardians of Indian democracy today had spared no efforts to suppress the voices raised in the defence of constitutional values.

Defence Minister Rajnath Singh said the Emergency, imposed by the then-prime minister Indira Gandhi in 1975 before she lifted it in 1977 and called for elections, is a black chapter in Indian democracy which cannot be forgotten.

Later in the day, BJP president J P Nadda will address an event at party headquarters titled “dark days of democracy.”

In Uttar Pradesh, Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, speaking to the media for the first time since BJP’s poor show in Lok Sabha elections, asked the Congress to apologise to the country for the excesses of the Emergency.

The BJP’s trenchant criticism of the Congress came amid a coordinated campaign by opposition parties to paint the government led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi as working against the Constitution.

The Congress and other opposition members carried copies of the Constitution in Parliament on Monday as the first session of the 18th Lok Sabha began.

Modi on Monday also invoked the imposition of the Emergency to target the Congress and called upon people to ensure that it is never repeated.