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Congress leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury on Friday criticised External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar for the latter's remarks on the Emergency, saying that multiple times Congress party has repeatedly expressed regret for it such that an election was called by former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi knowing well that she might be defeated.
"His predecessor, Pranab Mukherjee, regretted the issue of the imposition of Emergency in public in 2008. Once the Emergency was lifted, Indira Gandhi herself admitted that it was a mistake. On several occasions, Congress repeatedly expressed regrets, but now the ruling party is trying to tarnish Congress," the Congress leader told ANI here. He said that all those things are known by the EAM; however, he is being subservient to the 'diktats' of the Centre to keep on continuing his ministerial tenure. "Mr Jaishankar knows everything, but to continue his ministerial tenure, he needs to be subservient to the dictates of the present government... What was the role of RSS during the Independence movement, Quit India, partition, and after independence?" he said. Meanwhile, Congress leader Jairam Ramesh also slammed the EAM, saying he should focus on dealing with the "collapse of Indian diplomacy" rather than talk about the Emergency. "EAM would be well advised to deal with the complete collapse of Indian diplomacy. Indian diplomacy has taken huge hits in the last couple of weeks. He should be worried about repairing the damage to Indian diplomacy rather than getting into the history of what happened 50 years ago," the Congress leader told ANI. Earlier today, Jaishankar aimed at the Congress party, stating that one family's interests were placed above the nation, while he remembered the 50th anniversary of the Emergency. "All this happened because of one family... There's a movie titled 'Kissa Kursi Ka', and these three words aptly tell the reason behind the imposition of the Emergency. When a family is considered above the nation, things like the Emergency take place," Jaishankar said. The EAM was addressing the inaugural session of a mock parliament, which was organised by Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha (BJYM). He recalled that during the Emergency, the opposition side of the parliament was empty as leaders were jailed. He stated that during that time he was a 20-year-old student at Jawaharlal Nehru University. He further said that the biggest lesson from the Emergency was to never take one's freedom for granted. (ANI)
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