Congress Didn't Want Narasimha Rao's Last Rites To Be Held In Delhi: JP Nadda

New Delhi: BJP President JP Nadda, on Saturday, launched a pincer attack on the Congress stating it never wanted the last rites of former Prime Minister late PV Narasimha Rao to take place in Delhi.

Nadda's remarks came after a row erupted over a memorial for the former prime minister, with the Congress demanding that former PM Manmohan Singh's last rites be performed at a place where a memorial could be built later.

In a sharp rebuke, Nadda said, "The Congress never gave respect to Manmohan Singh when he was alive now it is politicising in the name of respect."

Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi said the BJP-led Centre had "totally insulted" Singh, a great son of Mother India and the first prime minister from the Sikh community, by performing his last rites at Nigambodh Ghat.

Reacting sharply, Nadda said, "It's very unfortunate that former Congress president Rahul Gandhi and incumbent Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge are not refraining from playing politics even over the former prime minister's sad demise." "No amount of condemnation is enough for such cheap thinking of the Congress. The Congress, which never gave real respect to Manmohan Singh when he was alive, is now playing politics in the name of his respect," he added.

The Union minister said the government under Prime Minister Narendra Modi had allocated space for Singh's memorial and also informed his family about it.

"Yet, the Congress is spreading lies," he said.

"Rahul Gandhi, Mallikarjun Kharge and other Congress leaders should refrain from indulging in such cheap politics," Nadda said.

The BJP chief alleged that the Congress "tarnished and degraded" the prime minister's position by making Sonia Gandhi the "super prime minister" instead of Singh.

"Not just this. The way Rahul Gandhi insulted Manmohan Singh by tearing an ordinance, there is no other example of this," he added.

"The same Congress is today playing politics over the death of Manmohan Singh," the BJP chief said, alleging that the Gandhi family had not given respect to anyone except itself.

Nadda charged that the Gandhi family did not do justice to Singh or any other leader -- be them from the Congress or other parties -- citing the examples of BR Ambedkar, India's first president Rajendra Prasad, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, former prime ministers Lal Bahadur Shastri, PV Narasimha Rao and Atal Bihari Vajpayee, ex-president Pranab Mukherjee, and Sitaram Kesri.

"The Gandhi family has always insulted all other big leaders (other than those in the family)," the BJP chief said.

He alleged that Sonia Gandhi had rejected the request for setting up a monument to Rao.

"His (Rao's) body was not even given a place in the Congress office. The Congress did not want his last rites to be held in Delhi. His funeral was held in Hyderabad. It was Modi who established the memorial to Rao in 2015 and honoured him with the Bharat Ratna," Nadda said.

"Even after the passing of Vajpayee ji, Congress leaders and their supporters continued to insult him," he charged.

In 2020, when Bharat Ratna Pranab Mukherjee died, the Congress Working Committee "did not even bother" to call a condolence meeting.

"In 2013, the Congress government decided to build a national memorial and had said that there would be no separate memorial for any leader. It was Prime Minister Modi who built the Prime Ministers Museum and Library to remember them and to make people of the country familiar with them," he said.

"...the Congress has only built memorials for its family members," the BJP chief said and asked the party to learn from Modi the true meaning of giving respect.

Nadda said that, according to an estimate, about 600 government schemes, educational institutions, awards, roads, national parks, museums, airports, ports and buildings in the country were named after members of the Nehru-Gandhi family by Congress governments.

"The number of schemes in the name of other personalities can be counted on the fingers," he said and added, "Our country will neither forget nor forgive the sins of the unprincipled Congress." (with PTI inputs)