New Delhi: Speaking during the parliament’s debate on the Indian constitution on Saturday (December 14), Prime Minister Narendra Modi mostly summarised points raised through the last two working days by senior BJP leaders like Rajnath Singh, Ravi Shankar Prasad and Kiren Rijiju in his Lok Sabha speech.
Like Singh, who initiated the debate on Friday, Modi asserted that the BJP, like the members of the Constituent Assembly, believed that India wasn’t born in 1947 but represented a civilisation, and that his respect for the constitution emerged from this long-held thought.
Like other senior BJP leaders who spoke in the debate, Modi went on to attack the Congress for imposing the Emergency, steering the first constitutional amendment imposing reasonable restrictions on Article 19 in 1951, and bringing in Article 370 to allow Jammu and Kashmir to have its own constitution.
At the same time, he listed out his government’s welfare schemes like free rations, the distribution of LPG cylinders, the allotment of toilets and housing, its free health insurance scheme and other such deliverables to assert that his government worked in the direction that the constitution showed – that is, to empower and protect marginalised groups like women, OBCs, Dalits, Adivasis and diverse sections of the poor.
He did this even as he slammed the Gandhi family for hijacking the Congress and working against the interests of those who did not have any distinguished pedigree.
However, as Modi spoke along these lines, he diverted from the narrative set by other party leaders to declare that his government was working towards implementing a “secular civil code”, while alleging that the Congress-led opposition was allegedly conspiring to violate constitutional values by implementing a quota system along religious lines.
“They want to give reservations on the basis of faith, which will be nothing but a solid assault on the constitution. Even Babasaheb Ambedkar strongly advocated a Universal Civil Code and wanted to scrap all personal codes. Even the Constituent Assembly member K.M. Munshi said that UCC was necessary to build a modern India. The Supreme Court has said so multiple times. And I will use all my strength to bring in a secular civil code,” Modi declared.
The prime minister then lapsed into his usual diatribe against the Congress’s parivaarvaad and recounted events that he believed were the biggest assaults on the constitution.
“Unity in diversity is our specialty. We celebrate this aspect of Bharat. But those who have a slave mentality have only looked to find contradictions in our diversity for their ‘vote bank politics’. They have always tried to sow poisonous seeds in our diverse culture and population to break India’s unity,” he said.
On the other hand, he said, his government has tried to unite the nation socially and economically by removing Article 370 and implementing projects like One Nation, One Tax; One Nation, One Ration Card; One Nation, One Constitution; the complete electrification of the country; and bringing in 33% reservation for women in parliament.
“Our policies and decisions reflect constitutional values. This is our way to pay true homage to Babasaheb Ambedkar,” he said.
He said the Congress had no right to speak about the constitution as it was the primary culprit in violating its spirit. He quoted India’s first prime minister from a letter that he had sent to the chief ministers of the time, which said that “if the constitution came in our way, it should be amended”.
He alleged that the Congress had “tasted blood” by violating the constitution a number of times, before recalling the 1951 ordinance that set up the first amendment to Article 19, the emergency, and the reversal of the 1985 Supreme Court in parliament to pander to communal and extremist interests.
Modi took a dig at the Congress’s allies in the Lok Sabha by alleging that “even those parties who are sitting on the other side have faced the Congress’s assaults when their leaders were arrested”.
“They have tasted blood by messing with the constitution. And the next generation of the Congress family is only looking to continue such assaults on the constitution,” he said. He went on to say that an extra-constitutional body, the National Advisory Council, was formed over Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and his cabinet to dictate governance.
“PM Manmohan Singh had agreed that the real power [of the UPA government] rested with the one who led the party, not his government,” Modi said.
He took aim at Rahul Gandhi by saying that there was a time when an arrogant dynast of the party had torn off a cabinet ordinance in full glare of the media. Gandhi had opposed a Manmohan Singh cabinet ordinance in 2013 that gave convicted MPs a three month reprieve to retain their seats.
“The most unfortunate thing was that after he publicly tore off a cabinet order, the decision was also reversed by the government,” Modi said.
Interestingly, it was the annulment of the ordinance that also allowed the Modi government to disqualify Gandhi in 2023 after he was convicted by a Surat court in a defamation case.
Modi then went on to mention the cash-for-votes scam in parliament and the unceremonious overthrow of extremely backward class leader Sitaram Kesri as Congress president to accommodate a person from the ‘family’ – that is, Sonia Gandhi – as the party head.
“Twelve state committees of the Congress had recommended Sardar Patel to become the prime minister, while Pandit Nehru was recommended by none. Yet, he was chosen as the prime minister. How can a party which doesn’t respect its own constitution be expected to respect India’s constitution,” he said.
He said that unlike the previous Congress governments, his government has proudly brought amendments to the constitution to “correct past mistakes”. He said having an OBC commission, removing Article 370 and other such welfare measures were done to unite the nation as part of the duties that are enshrined in the constitution.
Modi’s speech was accompanied by huge uproar from the opposition benches. The prime minister carefully evaded questions that the opposition leaders raised during the debate and stuck to his pitch to discount what the BJP has been calling the opposition’s “fake narrative”.
After a number of BJP leaders in the run-up to the Lok Sabha polls spoke about how the party needed a 400-plus majority in the Lok Sabha to fulfil its intention to change the constitution, the opposition had led a nation-wide campaign against such remarks.
BJP leaders have since then said that its relatively lacklustre performance in the polls was largely owing to such a “fake narrative” by the opposition, and has contested the opposition campaign at every level by speaking of its commitment to the constitution.
The prime minister also did not respond to the opposition’s charges regarding his government’s alleged high-handedness in arresting opposition leaders or engineering defections to wrest power from opposition parties in different states, as well as its inability to defuse ethnic tensions in Manipur, even as he spoke about how his government brought unforeseen development in the north-eastern states.
Rahul Gandhi invokes Savarkar’s opposition to the constitution
Earlier in the day, Gandhi, who is leader of opposition in the Lok Sabha, had pointed to Hindutva ideologue V.D. Savarkar’s opposition to the constitution.
“When we look at the constitution and we open the constitution, we can hear the voice and the ideas of Ambedkar, of Mahatma Gandhi, of Jawaharlal Nehru. But where did those ideas come from? Those ideas came from very old profound traditions in this country; those ideas came from Shiva, from Guru Nanak, from Basavanna, from Buddha, from Mahavira, from Kabir, from a list of people,” Gandhi said.
Quoting Savarkar’s views on the constitution, Gandhi said, “The worst thing about the Constitution of India is that there is nothing Indian about it. Manusmriti is that scripture which is most worshippable after the Vedas for our Hindu nation and from which our ancient times have become the basis for our culture, customs, thought and practice. This book, for centuries, has codified the spiritual and divine march of our nation. Today, Manusmiriti is law.”
“These are the words of Savarkar,” Gandhi said.
“Now, it is nice that all of you are so-called defenders of the constitution, but I want to ask you – do you stand by your leader’s words? Do you support your leader’s words, because when you speak in parliament about protecting the constitution, you are ridiculing Savarkar, you are abusing Savarkar, you are defaming Savarkar,” he said.
Gandhi spoke about a battle of ideas currently taking place in India. He said that when the Congress speaks about the constitution, it takes inspiration from thinkers like Periyar, Mahatma Gandhi, Basavanna, Jyotiba Phule and Ambedkar, but when the BJP speaks about the constitution, it thinks of archaic conservative texts like the Manusmriti and wants to take India back to Brahmanical and feudal systems.
He went on to compare the Modi government to Dronacharya, the mythical guru in the Mahabharata, who asked his best archery student, the ‘low-caste’ Ekalavya, to cut his thumb to protect Arjuna, the soon-to-be-appointed successor of the Pandava royal dynasty.
The LoP said that the Modi government was similarly cutting off the thumbs of India’s disadvantaged youngsters by showing ‘favouritism’ to the Adani group, making lateral entry a legitimate practice in the bureaucracy and institutionalising unprotected jobs though schemes like Agnipath in the defence forces.
He also took the opportunity to reiterate his demand for a caste census and removing the 50% ceiling on quotas to embolden his social justice pitch that he has raised since the run-up to the Lok Sabha polls.
