New Delhi: Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Thursday said students are now coming out to express themselves and this cannot be stopped, as he urged them to use this energy for bringing fundamental changes for the country’s youths.
Addressing an event to mark the birth anniversary of his father, former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi, he said Mahatma Gandhi’s vision of India to enable everyone to tread the path of ‘swaraj’ can be achieved only if the government opens the doors to the young people and the country helps them walk on that path.
The leader of opposition in Lok Sabha also accused the BJP-RSS of attacking minorities, taking away the land of tribals and oppressing Dalits, saying these need to be reversed.
“The job of the government and the country is to open the doors to your imagination and to make you feel and believe and have the confidence that what truth is for them… The country should help you walk on that path. That is Gandhiji’s vision for India, and that is the path of Swaraj.
“This is the political fight taking place in India. The students are saying we have an expression and we believe in certain things as individuals. I am very proud now that millions of young students have understood this. That the pain they were feeling was being caused because they were being trapped and not allowed to express themselves. Now that expression has suddenly come out and it cannot be stopped,” Gandhi said.
He was speaking at the event “Hara Bhara Swaraj: A Tribute to Rajiv Gandhi’s Vision” at Jawahar Bhawan, where former Rajasthan chief minister Ashok Gehlot and several other party leaders and youths were present.
Noting that merely having that expression does not mean anything, he said it has to be translated into transforming the system for the youth of the country.
“How will that expression transform the education system of our country? How will that education system transform the fact that you can do whatever you want? That’s really the question. How can we use this awakening, energy, now to make fundamental changes for young people going forward? This is the fight. There is no possibility of ‘swaraj’ for the large mass of Indian people if one man owns every single business in this country. It cannot be done.”
He said Mahatma Gandhi’s vision cannot exist without certain fundamental things.
“It cannot exist with an education system that is so expensive, it cannot exist with a testing system that is unfair, it cannot exist with a financial system that is monopolised by two or three people, it cannot exist without a political system that reaches deep inside the country – panchayati raj, MLAs, MPs etc. etc. That is really what you have to do.”
Rahul Gandhi said the Congress wants the type of India where every individual feels special.
“Imagine what the BJP-RSS has done, they have told 16 per cent of the people – Muslims, Christians and Sikhs, that they do not exist and if they open their mouth, they will see what they will do to them. Next they have said to 10 per cent Adivasis that they will take their land whenever they want and if they fight for their land, they will be shot,” he claimed.
Rahul Gandhi also claimed that the BJP-RSS have told Dalits, who comprise 15 per cent of the population, that they have dealt with social oppression in the past and why they are complaining and that there is nothing wrong with the caste system.
“That is what they have done to this country. That is what they have done to our ‘Bharat Mata’… and that needs to be reversed,” he noted.
“Every single person, regardless of religion, caste, age, or gender, must feel: I belong here. I am loved here. I am respected here. And my search for truth matters,” Gandhi said.
The former Congress chief said the word ‘Swaraj’ is often confused with the western word ‘freedom’, as people think ‘Swaraj’ means freedom, but Swaraj means – ‘swa’ over ‘raj’, meaning ‘rule over oneself’ and it is a way of thinking. ‘Swaraj’ is a ‘Hindustani’ word and the two should not be mixed up,” he said, adding that one can give freedom to someone, but not ‘swa-raj’.
He said Mahatma Gandhi wanted every person in the country to walk on this path of ‘Swaraj’, but that cannot be done without proper environment.
The Congress MP said Mahatma Gandhi’s book on truth was not called ‘my experiments’, but ‘my experiments with truth’ and not ‘the truth’.
“Today, the ideological battle in India is this. The real fight is that a group of people who control the system have decided that they know the truth of everybody in this country.
“When Mr Narendra Modi says ‘I forgive the students’, meaning, ‘…I know everything and you don’t know anything and I forgive you’. That’s why they attack students every single day. Then suddenly they got scared and Mohan Bhagwat ji said students should not be attacked,” he said, adding that this fight is on as they are attacking everyone after believing that they know the truth.
