Rahul's ISIS analogy in Germany stirs row

Cong chief raps Modi Govt, links violence, lynchings with joblessness, demonetization

Congress president Rahul Gandhi has triggered a controversy by slamming the Modi Government on a foreign soil  by saying that the BJP Government’s exclusionary politics may create a platform similar to the one that led to creation of the Islamic State (ISIS). Speaking at a gathering at the Bucerius Summer School in Hamburg on Wednesday night, Rahul flayed the Modi Government over a range of issues, including lynching and economic policies, and sought to see a link between unemployment and rise in violent incidents.

The Congress chief claimed the rising incidents of lynching in India were due to anger emanating from joblessness and “destruction” of small businesses due to demonetisation and “poorly implemented” GST by the ruling BJP.

Rahul said similar factors led to the creation of terror group ISIS in Iraq and Syria.

“It is very dangerous in the 21st century to exclude people. If you don’t give people a vision in the 21st century, somebody else will give them one... And that’s the real risk of excluding large number of people from our development process,” he said, accusing the BJP Government of excluding tribals, Dalits and minorities from the development process.

Affirming that the transformation taking place in the world requires certain protection for people, he accused the current dispensation in India of taking these protections away from them and hitting the informal economy through demonetisation and GST, causing anger which is leading to lynching incidents.

“They (the BJP Government) feel that tribal communities, poor farmers, lower caste people, minorities shouldn’t get the same benefits as the elite,” the Congress president alleged.

Rahul claimed the other thing the BJP has done is that they have started attacking the support structures created to help certain groups of people.

“That is not the only damage they’ve done. There is something much more dangerous,” he said.

He alleged that a couple of years back Prime Minister Narendra Modi “demonetised the Indian economy and destroyed the cash flow” of all small and medium businesses rendering millions jobless.”

“They imposed a badly conceptualised GST which complicated lives further,” Rahul said.

“A large number of people who worked in small businesses were forced back to villages and these three things that the Government has done has made India angry,” he said.

Rahul, who later took questions from the audience, also referred to his hugging the Prime Minister during the debate in Parliament on the No-Confidence Motion, saying certain “hateful remarks” made against him by Modi prompted him to do so but “he (Modi) didn’t like and was upset by it”.

The Congress leader is in Germany as part of a reach-out programme to the NRI community ahead of next year’s Lok Sabha elections. He will also go to the United Kingdom.

“China produces 50,000 jobs every 24 hours, India only 450,” Rahul said, adding that bad implementation of GST had let to closure of thousands of businesses.

“These things are what have made people in India angry. That is what you get to read in newspapers. When you hear about lynchings in India, when you hear about attacks on Dalits in India, when you hear about attacks on minorities in India, that is the reason for it,” Rahul claimed.

He said the transition that is shaping the world requires certain protection for people.

Speaking on prevalent violent incidents in India, the Congress president said hate is a dangerous thing in a connected world and it is a choice. “I can fight you, take you on. I can compete with you but hating you is something I have to actively chose to do.”

Rahul also said his main complaint with Modi is that India has job problem but he does not say it and asked how it will be fixed if it is not even acknowledged.

Addressing the safety of women in the country, Rahul said level of violence is increasing in India and “women were getting a huge share of it”. He called for a change in the attitude of Indian men at the way they treated women.

Rahul said non-violence was a foundational philosophy of India’s nationhood and noted violence can only be fought by non-violence.

The Congress president said that he and his sister Priyanka Gandhi Vadra were not happy after his father’s (Rajiv Gandhi) killer, LTTE chief Prabhakaran was killed, as they felt “the violence inflicted upon him had impacted others, including his children”.

Referring to the assassinations of his grandmother Indira Gandhi and his father Rajiv Gandhi, he said the only way to move forward after violence is forgiveness.

“My grandmother (Indira Gandhi) and my father (Rajiv Gandhi) were both killed. So, I have suffered violence. I am talking actually from experience. The only way you can move forward after violence is forgiveness. There is no other way. And to forgive you have to understand what exactly happened and why it happened,” he added.

Rahul also answered questions on the US and China and said that India’s role will be to balance like that of Europe.

He said India’s actions will be guided by self-interest and noted that it is closer to the US than to China.

“There are different visions in the world, including that of the US, China and India. India has a strategic relationship with the US, and we share some ideas like democracy with them. But India cannot ignore that China is growing very fast and is going to shape the planet. India’s role is to balance these two powers,” Gandhi said in his address in Hamburg.

Referring to Modi coming to power in India and “certain style” of leaders coming to power in the US and some European countries, he said the reason was failure of jobs, particularly to non-white collar persons.

“We are outcompeted by Chinese. That is creating a lot of anger,” he said.

He also said India was not in a race with China but was wanted to develop according to its values.

The Congress president, who is on a four-day visit to Germany and the United Kingdom, will address the Indian Overseas Congress in Berlin on Thursday.

Thereafter, Rahul will visit the United Kingdom, where he will address an event organised by the Indian Overseas Congress in collaboration with local Indian-origin parliamentarians.