BHUBANESWAR: Odisha Pradesh Congress Committee (OPCC) president Bhakta Charan Das on Thursday came down heavily on the BJP government in the state for turning the birthday celebrations of Prime Minister Narendra Modi into an ‘official programme’ and demanded that the expenditure on it be audited and made public.
Addressing a media-conference here, Das described the celebration as an “unacceptable misuse of the state machinery”. Stating that a democratic government should not turn itself into a publicity agency for any individual, the OPCC chief said while common people were struggling to make a living, the government had chosen to indulge in unprecedented self-promotion.
“A birthday is a personal and private moment. Turning it into a government festival with taxpayers’ money is a direct insult to the democracy of the country,” Das remarked.
He further said that such government extravagance was completely contrary to India’s democratic traditions, claiming that former prime ministers like Jawaharlal Nehru, Lal Bahadur Shastri, Indira Gandhi, Atal Bihari Vajpayee or Manmohan Singh never used government machinery or money from the state exchequer for personal birthday celebrations during their tenures.