Leader of the Opposition in Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi attacked Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his statements about the Constitution of India, at Chimur in Chandrapur district of Maharashtra, where he addressed an election rally on Saturday.

“The Constitution contains the thoughts of martyrs like Birsa Munda and Komaram Bhim. In that sense, the Constitution is not a new book because its ideals have existed for thousands of years. A fight has been going on to defend the ideals mentioned in the Constitution for thousands of years. It contains the thinking of our great men and leaders of India, be it Dr Ambedkar, Mahatma Gandhi or Phule. All their thoughts are in this book called the Constitution,” he said.

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“The Congress says that the country should be run according to the Constitution but the RSS and the BJP wish to destroy the Constitution. I wave the Constitution to you at every meeting because I want to remind you of the martyrdom of our great leaders. I wish to remind you of your martyrs. I wish to remind you that this book was drafted due to their their pain, their sorrows and their blood. Gandhi gave up his life and Birsa Munda gave up his life to defend the ideals of this book. However, today the Prime Minister of India says that there is nothing inside this book and that it is an empty book. It seems empty or hollow to him because he has never read this book. The RSS does not believe in this book,” Gandhi said.

He said that Modi has waived off lakhs of crores of rupees owed to banks by billionaires. “Show me where it is written in Dr Ambedkar’s Constitution that Rs 16 lakh crores of 25 billionaires should be waived off and not a single rupee of labourers or farmers of India should be waived off? Where is it written? Did Birsa Munda give up his life to increase the wealth of Adani? Were the youths who were martyred here, martyred for Adani? Or did they die for the farmers of India, for the labourers of India, for the tribals of India and for the Dalits? When Narendra Modi says that there is nothing inside the Constitution and that it is empty, he is not insulting Rahul Gandhi. He is insulting Birsa Munda, Dr Ambedkar and Gandhi. Even more than that, he is insulting the citizens of India, the farmers of India, the labourers of India and the unemployed youth of India. This is the truth,” Gandhi thundered.

Gandhi told the rally that he has requested Narendra Modi to breach the limit of 50 per cent reservation. “I told him that I will fully support him if he does it, but he never utters a word. I told him that the country needs a caste census. Please conduct a caste census. Tell the backward people what is the size of their population. Tell the Dalits how much is their contribution. Tell the tribals how much is their contribution. Narendra Modi did not speak a single word. He gave a speech of one and a half hours, but never spoke a word about reservation or caste census. These days he says that Rahul Gandhi is against reservation”.

He mentioned that he talks about the caste census at every meeting. “I say in every meeting that there should be a caste census. You may ask me Rahul, why caste census and why should the limit on reservation be more than 50 per cent? In India, there are 8 per cent tribals, 15 per cent Dalits and 50 per cent OBCs. I have said 50 per cent, but nobody knows the actual number. Nobody knows because so far this question has never been asked in any census. The total population of all these groups comes to 90 per cent of India’s population, but they are not represented anywhere. You watch cricket matches but you never see anyone from the Dalit community in the media. Tribal people will never be seen. Backward class people are not seen. Take the list of anchors. Take the list of journalists. There are some 200 big TV anchors in India who talk 24 hours a day. Out of them, name one Dalit. Name one tribal. Tell me the name of anybody from the backward class. There is not even a single one,” Gandhi said.

Defendng the case for a caste census, he said, “Let’s list India’s biggest 200 companies. Let’s take the list of Adani’s companies or the list of Ambani’s companies. Tell me who is OBC among the owners of these companies. Who is Dalit? Who is in senior management? Are there any Dalits, tribals, OBCs? Tell me the names of Dalits. Tell me the name of tribals. Tell me the name of OBCs in the senior management.”

“You pay GST everyday while buying even a shirt. GST worth lakhs of crores of rupees come out of your pocket and go directly to Delhi. The budget is made in Delhi and 90 IAS officials draft the union budget, take all decisions and make all allocations. I have a list of these men,” Gandhi said that SC, STs, Dalits, OBCs and tribals hardly have any representation in the budget drafting process.

“You pay the GST money, but the loans of the rich get waived off and your land, the land of the poor people is taken away. I tell you, if 10 rich people lived in Dharavi, it would never be acquired for any project. The land of Dharavi is being acquired because backward people reside there. Dalits reside there. That is why Dharavi land is being acquired. Have you ever heard of rich people’s lands being acquired in this country? What crime have poor people done that your land gets acquired? Where is it written in the Constitution that the land of Dharavi worth one lakh crore rupees should be snatched from the poor and given to Adani? Show me on which page it is, and I will stop speaking,” Gandhi said.

The former Congress chief also stated that the Constitution mentions in its very first line that India belongs to every citizen. “It is not written in the Constitution that this country belongs to Adani and Ambani or that the entire benefit of this country must go only to a few billionaires. That is why we will give you the Mahalaxmi Yojana, that is why we will give you a health insurance scheme and that is why we are waiving off the loans of farmers. That is why we will deposit Rs 3000 in the bank accounts of the woman,” he said.

He said that the billionaires wish to sell Chinese goods in India. “They do not want production to take place in India. They want to sell China’s iPhone here. It is easy to sell China’s phones here. That’s why Narendra Modi ji has destroyed all small businesses,” he said.

He said that demonetization and GST has created unemployment in India. “As long as Narendra Modi’s government lasts, employment cannot be created in India. Our government will fill up 2.5 lakh government jobs which are lying vacant,” he said.

Speaking at Amravati earlier during the day, Gandhi said, “Maharashtra has a stolen government. This is not your government. Your government was stolen from you. This is a government formed against the Constitution. The fight is for the Constitution. The fight is for reservation. The fight is for caste census. The fight is for the right minimum support price (MSP) for farmers”.

“Everybody in Maharashtra knows why their government was stolen. The government was stolen because the BJP, Narendra Modi and Amit Shah wanted to snatch away the land of Dharavi which is worth Rs 1 lakh crore and give it to Gautam Adani. Your government was stolen from you by purchasing MLAs by paying money. The whole country knows that Amit Shah got this work done. Money does not fall from the sky. Nobody gives 40 crore to 50 crore for free. The Dharavi land deal was done, for which crores of rupees were given to MLAs. The entire country knows who ordered the deal. There is no need to even speak about it,” Gandhi charged.

Rahul said that his sister Priyanka said that Modi speaks about the same issues raised by the Congress. “My sister told me that these days, Modi says whatever we say. Maybe he has developed memory loss. In every meeting I keep saying that the BJP is attacking the Constitution, but the PM says that the Congress is attacking the Constitution. I have been saying in every meeting that we will breach the 50 per cent limit on reservations. But Modi got a memory loss and said that Rahul Gandhi is against reservations. One of these days, Modi might even say that Rahul Gandhi is against the caste census”.