Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi on Monday spoke on President Droupadi Murmu’s address to Parliament and said the BJP-led government in the last 10 years, had committed a systematic attack on the Constitution and the idea of India, creating fear among farmers and the common people.

In his first speech as the Leader of the Opposition in the House, Mr Gandhi said the BJP’s government was characterized by concentration of power and whoever resisted BJP’s ideas and the attack on the Constitution, was put in jail. There was aggression on Dalits, poor and minorities and he himself had to undergo 55 hours of interrogation by the Enforcement Directorate, he said.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Home Minister Amit Shah and some other Ministers objected to Mr Gandhi’s observations that the BJP did not represent the true spirit of Hinduism as it “talked” of violence and tried to create fear among people.

Mr Modi said this is a serious matter, Mr Gandhi is calling the whole Hindu society violent. Mr Gandhi said “The BJP does not represent the whole Hindu society; RSS too cannot claim to represent all Hindus.”

The Congress leader said his party’s symbol Hand represented the “abhaya mudra” (hand posture dispelling fear) which was also observed in the images of divine figures in all religions. Mr Gandhi said all religions want their followers to be fearless and not spread fear.

The Home Minister said crores of people are proud to be Hindus and the Leader of the Opposition calls them violent. It is not fair to link any religion with violence, he said. Mr Shah said how can a Congress leader talk of fear in the country when his party imposed the Emergency and the nation was in fear, and there were killings of Sikhs during the Congress rule.

Defence Minister Rajnath Singh responded to Mr Gandhi’s charge that the Agniveer jawans getting killed in action were not cared for. The Defence Minister said the government gave Rs 1 crore compensation to families of the Agniveers dying in action.

As Mr Gandhi continued to attack the government on various issues, Speaker Om Birla had to intervene repeatedly because of frequent interruptions from the Treasury Benches. Mr Birla agreed to the government’s request that Mr Gandhi’s claims be verified.

The Leader of the Opposition said the Hindus do not spread fear while the BJP does so 24 hours and its leaders created fear in the party also. He said Ayodhya, the birth place of Lord Rama, had given the message to the BJP by rejecting its candidate for the Lok Sabha.

Mr Gandhi said the Ayodhya’s Samajwadi Party MP Ayodhya Prasad, who sat by him, had told him the people of the constituency rejected the BJP because the party had created fear among people there by acquiring their land, and demolishing shops, without giving any compensation.

During his Bharat Jodi Yatra, he said, he had found women were living in fear because of price-rise, and getting beaten up by their husbands because they had no food to serve them because of price-rise. Fear was sought to be created among farmers through three farm laws. Mr Gandhi said they are still agitating for legally-guaranteed MSP for crops.

Students are financially and emotionally drained and have lost all hope because the professional exam NEET had been made commercial, enabling only the rich to get medical seats, he said. This has created a fear in the country. Manipur is forgotten.

Mr Gandhi said families of Agniveers also lived in fear and if his government came to power, it would end the Agniveer scheme. He said the government brought schemes suddenly like demonetization which destroyed small industry and jobs. The government should not consider the Opposition enemy, he said.

The motion of thanks to the President’s address was moved by BJP leader Anurag Thakur and seconded by Ms Bansuri Swaraj (BJP) and the two referred to numerous achievements of the BJP government which brought a mandate to Prime Minister Narendra for the third consecutive term.