NEW DELHI: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday blamed the Congress for the partition of India, and also said it was the Indira Gandhi government that gave the Katchatheevu Island to Sri Lanka in 1974.
The island, located between Rameswaram (India) and Sri Lanka, was traditionally used by both Sri Lankan and Indian fishermen.
In 1974, then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi accepted Katchatheevu as Sri Lankan territory under the "Indo-Sri Lankan Maritime Agreement".
"These people divided mother India into three parts for politics," the prime minister said in Lok Sabha, launching a blistering attack on the Congress during his reply to a debate on a no-confidence motion.
The prime minister said the DMK government in Tamil Nadu keeps writing to him urging him to bring Katchatheevu back to India.
"Katchatheevu is an island between Tamil Nadu and Sri Lanka. Somebody gave it to another country. It happened under the leadership of Indira Gandhi," he said.
"Wasn't that part of Maa Bharati there?" Modi asked in an apparent response to Congress leader Rahul Gandhi's remark during the debate on Wednesday.