KALABURAGI: Denying political clearance for the visit of Telangana CM Revanth Reddy to the US by the External Affairs Ministry (MEA) shows the mean mentality of the Union government, said AICC President Mallikarjun Kharge here on Saturday.
Kharge said that chief ministers visit different countries to attract investment. If the states prosper, the country will also develop. The Centre should not stop any chief minister from visiting other countries merely because they belong to other parties.He defended the Congress decision to sing only the first two stanzas of ‘Vande Mataram’ in its programmes.
He said the Congress had taken this decision more than half a century ago in a meeting attended by Jawaharlal Nehru, Sardar Vallabha Bhai Patel, Subhash Chandra Bose and Maulana Abdul Kalam Azad. Kharge said BJP is calling the Congress leaders who are not singing the full Vande Mataram song traitors. “Let the BJP leaders tell whether all these leaders who consented to sing only two stanzas of Vande Mataram as traitors,” he said.
He said that even state governments ruled by BJP have not implemented its Vande Mataram diktat so far.
He said that instead of digging up unnecessary controversies, the Centre should focus on increasing employment, ensuring education for all, and frame policies that are better than by the Congress government.
On PM Modi’s statement on bringing ‘need-based policies’, Kharge said that it was the first PM Jawaharlal Nehru who framed need-based policies and during his period big dams were constructed, medical and engineering colleges were started in different states. The opposition parties, which were supposed to continue them, only indulged in politics, he said.