Sorry for this long share but cant help myself from not doing that.. Below abstract is taken from Rahul Gandhis first interviews full text Arnab: The fact remains that Narendra Modi has been given a clean chit, in the Gulbarg massacre case by the SIT and the court Mr. Gandhi. My question to you is can the Congress party sustain its attack on Mr. Narendra Modi on this issue when he has been given the clean chit by the courts in the Gujarat riots Rahul : The congress party and the BJP have two completely different philosophies, our attack on the BJP is based on the idea that this country needs to move forward democratically, it needs push democracy deeper into the country, it needs to push democracy into the villagers, it needs to give women democratic powers, it needs to give youngsters democratic powers. It is about opening the doors of the congress party, about empowering the youth Arnab : How is Narendra Modi responsible for the riots when the courts have given him a clean chit, politically your partys tact to criticise Narendra Modi and draw him into the Gujarat riots? Rahul: Our political party is fighting an ideological battle Against the BJP and let me draw out the two pillars- our party believes that women should be empowered, democracy should go to every house, that RTI, and the MNREGA paradigm should be further expanded. The BJP believes power should be extremely concentrated in this country, few people should run this country and the large mass of this country should have no voice. Arnab: Specifically speaking how is Narendra Modi, your party criticised him for the 2002 Gujarat riots, and how can you do that when he has been given a clean chit in the Gulbarg massacre by the SIT of the court. It was challenged in the court, the court upheld the SIT finding and therefore legally speaking Mr. Gandhi you cannot draw Narendra Modi into the Gujarat riots, implicate him personally. Do you believe that strategy of your party is fundamentally wrong? Rahul: The strategy of the party is very simple. Everything we have done over that last 5-10years, in fact if you look all the way back to the freedom movement, every single thing we have ever done is empower people. We empowered people in the freedom movement, we empowered farmers in the Green revolution, and we empowered the citizens of India when we did the telecom revolution. We have empowered millions and millions of people through frankly the most powerful legislation that has ever taken place in this country called the RTI- Right to information. Things that used to be closed, things that were in closed doors which nobody knew about Arnab: I will come to that but you havent answered my question. Gujarat riots is the question, your party has consistently wanted to put Mr. Narendra Modi on the back foot on the Gujarat riots, he says the court has given me clean chit and I am asking you today, is your partys argument about putting him on the back foot on Gujarat is flawed given the ways the courts have looked at it Rahul: The PM has stated his position on the Gujarat riots. The Gujarat riots took place, people died, Mr. Narendra Modi was in charge of Gujarat at that point. I am bringing you to a real ideological battle that is taking place here. The real ideological battle that is taking place here and the one we are going to win and that has always been one in this country is the battle of empowering people in this country. Of course there is your point of the Gujarat riots and it is very important that people who have taken part in this kind of thing are brought to book. But the real issue at hand here is empowering the women of this country, giving them true power. We talk about India being a superpower we can only be half a superpower if our women are not empowered. What I want to do is going forward is basically focus on three things. Focus on empowering our people, truly empowering our people, giving them democratic rights within the political party. I want youngsters who come in and really, really push democracy in the party. I want to empower them and I want to make India, together with everybody, taking everybody together I want to put India on the manufacturing map, I want to make this the centre of manufacturing in the world. I want to make this place at least as much as a manufacturing power as China. articles.timesofindia.indiatimes/2014-01-27/india/46684096_1_rahul-gandhi-arnab-goswami-aicc/3
Posted on: Thu, 30 Jan 2014 07:55:39 +0000