Disqualify me for life, will keep fighting for democracy: Rahul Gandhi

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, March 25

After losing his Lok Sabha membership following a two-year sentence in a 2019 defamation case, Congress leaders Rahul Gandhi told the media on Saturday that he was disqualified because Prime Minister Narendra Modi was “scared of his next speech in Parliament on industrialist Gautam Adani”.

I’m Gandhi, not Savarkar

My name is not Savarkar, my name is Gandhi and Gandhi does not offer an apology to anyone. Rahul Gandhi, Congress

Declaring that he was not scared of disqualification or going to jail, Rahul (52) said he would keep asking questions even if that meant disqualification for life.

“Disqualify me for life or put me in jail, I will keep fighting for democracy. I will not stop,” he said.

Rahul alleged that they (BJP government) did not want him to attend Parliament. “The PM was terrified of my next speech. I see fear in his eyes. That’s the reason for the ‘distraction’ in Parliament and now my disqualification,” the former Wayanad MP said at a press conference at the AICC headquarters with top leaders, including Chief Ministers Ashok Gehlot and Bhupesh Baghel, flanking him. Claiming that he was here defending the democratic voice of the Indian people, he said, “I will continue to do that. I am not scared of these threats, disqualifications, allegations or prison sentences. These people don’t understand me yet, I am not scared of them.”

While the Congress top brass later held a strategy meeting and vowed to take the fight to the ground, Rahul termed the developments as a “panic reaction by the government”. “They have given the Opposition the biggest weapon,” he noted, thanking other parties for rallying behind him and urging them to work together.

The former Congress chief was, however, evasive about the BJP spinning his defamatory remarks “How come all thieves have Modi surname” into an anti-OBC narrative. “Everything the government is doing, including the OBC narrative, is meant to distract from the main question about the relationship between PM and Adani and about whose Rs 20,000 crore are invested in Adani’s shell companies,” he said.Rahul reiterated his London remarks today saying “democracy had been finished in India”.

The Congress leader, who plans to start the second leg of his ‘Bharat Jodo Yatra’ soon, alleged that Union ministers lied that he sought foreign intervention to save Indian democracy. “I never said foreign powers should help us. I said fixing democracy is our own issue but I was not allowed to respond in the Lok Sabha. When I met Speaker Om Birla to seek permission, he smiled and said he could not do anything,” he said, refusing to comment on his legal strategy.

Maintaining that he would not apologise, he said, “My name is not Savarkar, my name is Gandhi and Gandhi does not offer an apology to anyone.” He said during his ‘yatra’, he had spoken of bringing all segments together (in reference to BJP’s anti-OBC offensive).

Rahul, who had tendered an unconditional apology to the apex court for attributing “Chowkidar chor hai” comments to the SC, also said that he did not care whether or not he was an MP. “My mission is to speak the truth and I will continue with my ‘tapasya’ (mission),” he said. Rahul is said to be planning to soon write a letter to the people of Wayanad explaining how he felt about the turn of events. The Congress will hold a ‘satyagrah’ across the country on Sunday.

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