BJP-RSS people traitors, beware of them: Cong chief Kharge

MHOW: The BJP and RSS are "traitors" and people should be wary of them, Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge said on Monday, claiming they talk about not looking for "shivlings under mosques" but instigate people to do so.

Addressing the "Jai Bapu, Jai Bhim, Jai Samvidhan" rally here, the Congress president said independence was achieved fighting under the leadership of Mahatma Gandhi, and today those who keep abusing the Congress -- "the people of the RSS" -- only worked for the British.

"They had no participation, no part in the freedom struggle. Will you forgive such people?" Kharge asked the large gathering at the rally held in this Madhya Pradesh town where Ambedkar was born.

"If you want to teach a lesson to these people, unite, and protect the rights you have got by uniting. If you don't do this, the loss is yours, the loss is not of Rahul Gandhi, Sonia Gandhi or the big people sitting on the stage. The loss is of the Dalit, backward, tribal and the poor," Kharge said, asking the crowd to think in this direction or they will not get any right.

Kharge also took a swipe at the Modi government and said it was standing on "two legs" -- BJP allies led by Chandrababu Naidu and Nitish Kumar -- and a simple push can topple it.

He urged people to not heed the theory of M S Golwalkar, V D Savarkar or K B Hedgewar and move forward with the ideology of Babasaheb Ambedkar, Jawaharlal Nehru and Mahatma Gandhi.

"And I want to tell you one more thing that these people of the BJP are openly insulting every community. Stop it, whatever happened has happened. The court also said but everyone together is instigating a few people today. The RSS people also said that don't look for 'Shivling under mosques', they themselves stated this, but they themselves instigate," Kharge said.

"On one hand they speak, on the other hand they instigate. So that is why we have to live in peace. If anybody does injustice (to anybody), you should have the strength to fight against that injustice, but the BJP-RSS is taking advantage of this, instigating people and trying their best to remove rights, the fundamental rights we have in the Constitution," he said.

"I heard from somewhere that the BJP people have started the work of making another Constitution. Today I want to tell you that establishing equality of people in the society was one of the aims of Babasaheb and that is why he made many laws. If anyone gave him complete support, it was Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru and Mahatma Gandhi," Kharge said.

He said if people are united the BJP will never succeed in changing the Constitution.

He urged the Dalit, backward and the tribal to unite, saying until they are united, they will not get entry into temples.

During the Mhow rally, Kharge also took a swipe at Home Minister Amit Shah's remarks in Rajya Sabha that had created a furore during the Winter Session.

"'Abhi ek fashion ho gaya hai -- Ambedkar, Ambedkar, Ambedkar, Ambedkar, Ambedkar, Ambedkar. Itna naam agar bhagwan ka lete to saat janmon tak swarg mil jata (It has become a fashion these days to say Ambedkar, Ambedkar, Ambedkar, Ambedkar, Ambedkar, Ambedkar. If they had taken God's name so many times, they would have got a place in heaven)'," Shah had said in a jibe at the opposition.

Referring to Shah's remarks, Kharge said at the rally, "This is their mindset. This is their respect to Babasaheb Ambedkar. So beware of them. Those people want to wipe us off. Do you want to live or get wiped off. If you want to stay alive then fight and if you fight, people like Amit Shah will run away."

He added, "Babasaheb, who gave the Constitution, fought for the people and saved them, they (BJP) say 'Ambedkar, Ambedkar kitni baar bolte ho, itni baar bhagwan ka naam lete toh aap saat janam tak swarg mein jaate'. Arey tum toh itna paap kiye ho. Modi ji aur Shah milke itna paap kiye hain woh saat janam kya sau janam mein bhi swarg mein nahi ja sakte. Kabhi nahi...Aur logon ke shraap se inhe narak hi milega (Modi and Amit Shah have committed so many sins they cannot go into heaven even in 100 lives. Never. They will get hell due to people's curse)."

He said Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi and the Congress party together have stopped the BJP from coming to power with a full majority.

"What did they say in the elections? “"Iss baar 400 paar'...now you are not even in the majority. You stand on two supporting legs, one is of Andhra Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu and the other is of Bihar's Nitish Kumar. Modi is standing on these two legs, if someone pushes him like this, he is going to fall, this government is going to fall," Kharge said taking a jibe at the prime minister.

The Congress chief also cited the remarks of Vallabhbhai Patel and Jawaharlal Nehru after Mahatma Gandhi's assassination to hit out at the RSS.

"In those circumstances, the government had no other option but to take action against the RSS, this was stated by Vallabhbhai Patel. He gave the order to ban this RSS, the same people who create a dispute between Vallabhbhai Patel and Nehruji. Vallabhbhai Patel had stated that 'I will never spare those people who killed Gandhiji, killed our leader, I will ban them'," Kharge said.

"Nehru ji was also very angry, he had said this, 'We should live together and destroy the issue of the fierce communalism that killed the greatest man of our era, those forces should be uprooted'. These are Nehru ji's words, not mine. Nehru ji said this and further said - People who organise celebrations on Gandhi ji's assassination, people who distribute sweets, they do not even have the right to be called Indians," he said.

The RSS-BJP are "traitors" and they call others that, Kharge asserted.

"These are not my words, I have used the words of Vallabhbhai Patel ji, Nehru ji and they all together built this country," he added.

The Constitution has to be saved to ensure that people are brought out of poverty, Kharge said.

"If you want to fight poverty, fight inflation, fight unemployment, then we will have to work under the Constitution and Modi and Shah will never let us do so," Kharge said.

He also rebutted the BJP's charge that the Congress was behind Ambedkar's defeat in the 1952 polls and cited a letter by him to state that Ambedkar had blamed S A Dange and Savarkar, for his defeat.

The rally was attended by former Congress chief Rahul Gandhi and senior party leaders Jairam Ramesh, K C Venugopal, chief ministers Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu (Himachal Pradesh) and Revanth Reddy (Telangana), among others.