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Addressing a gathering at Karwar in Karnataka, Hegde said the BJP needs a two-third majority in both houses of Parliament to amend the Constitution and ”set right the distortions and unnecessary additions made to it by the Congress”.
Congress leader Rahul Gandhi said the BJP MP’s remark was a public declaration of the ”hidden intentions” of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and their ”Sangh Parivar”.
Party chief Mallikarjun Kharge claimed that Hegde’s statement ”yet again exposes Modi-RSS’ devious agenda to impose dictatorship”.
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”There will be NO Elections, or at the most, just sham elections. Independence of institutions shall be curtailed. Freedom of expression shall be bulldozed. The RSS and the BJP will destroy our secular fabric and unity in diversity,” Kharge alleged and asserted that the Congress would not allow these ”ulterior motives” of the ‘Sangh Parivar’ to succeed.
He alleged that such repeated calls by the BJP-RSS, from time to time were a ”direct assault” on the ”unquestionable ethos of sovereign, socialist, secular, democratic espoused by our Constitution makers”.
”Justice, Equality, and Liberty are the strong pillars of the Constitution and any change in these principles would be an insult to the India envisioned by Babasaheb Dr Ambedkar and our revered founders,” the Congress chief said.
”It is the solemn responsibility of every Indian to protect our democracy and the Constitution,” he said on X using the hashtag ”Samvidhan Bachao BJP Hatao”.
Rahul Gandhi alleged that the ”ultimate goal of Narendra Modi and the BJP is to destroy Baba Saheb’s Constitution.” ”They hate justice, equality, civil rights and democracy. By dividing the society, enslaving the media, trammelling the right to freedom of expression and crippling independent institutions, they want to turn India’s great democracy into a narrow dictatorship by conspiring to eliminate the opposition,” he alleged in a post in Hindi on X.
The former Congress chief said they would not let these ”conspiracies” with the dreams of the heroes of India’s struggle for Independence succeed and would continue to fight for the democratic rights guaranteed by the Constitution till the last breath.
”Every soldier of the Constitution, especially Dalits, tribals, backward and minorities, wake up, raise your voice – INDIA is with you,” he also said using the hashtag ‘Samvidhan Bachao BJP Hatao’.
Congress general secretary Jairam Ramesh said the BJP MP, a former Union Minister, and ”Modi’s favourite” Anantkumar Hegde has only revealed what was already known. ”The goal of the BJP and RSS is to overturn Babasaheb Ambedkar’s Constitution,” he alleged.
”All the prime minister’s rhetoric about crossing 400 seats is geared towards the goal of dismantling the Constitution — the last protector of the rights of India’s people, especially of Dalits, Adivasis, OBCs, and religious minorities,” he said.
”If we have to save Babasaheb Ambedkar’s Constitution and preserve Indian democracy, we must vote the Modi Sarkar out,” Ramesh said in a post on X.
Reacting to Hegde’s statement, Karnataka deputy chief minister and state Congress chief D K Shivakumar said this showed that the BJP was ”anti-Constitution”.
”Let him do it, amend the Constitution… this shows that the BJP government (at the Centre) and the BJP MP are against the Constitution given by Babasaheb Ambedkar. Let him get it stamped by the prime minister,” he told reporters.