Lok Sabha polls to be 'Mahabharath yudh' between Congress-RSS: P Chidambaram

TIRUCHIRAPPALLI: Finance Minister P Chidambaram has said the 2014 Lok Sabha elections would be a "Mahabharath yudh" between Congress and the RSS "which has chosen" Narendra Modi as the BJP's Prime Ministerial candidate.


"It will be a Mahabharath yudh between the Congress and an organisation that has all along claimed to be non-political but chose to take indirect control of its political face," the senior Congress leader told a public meeting organised by the party here late last night.

He alleged that the RSS "has been trying to sow seeds of evil and divide the people on communal lines."

Claiming that several Muslim youths were killed in encounters in Gujarat, Chidambaram said he did not approve of encounters when he was the Home Minister.

He had ordered security forces that "terrorists or criminals should be captured alive unless they opened fire," Chidambaram added.

The Minister said Congress was responsible for various "revolutionary" laws and programmes including the Right to Information Act, Right to Education Act, employment guarantee scheme and Food Security Act.

He assured that the Food Security Act would not affect the interests of Tamil Nadu which would get about Rs. 914 crore more as central subsidy for the public distribution system. There would be no reduction in the allotment of foodgrains to the state, he added.

AICC Secretary S Thirunavukkarasar said minorities would never support Modi as a moderate leader.

"RSS has nominated Modi as the Prime Ministerial candidate as there were too many contenders in the BJP. There is no such confusion in the Congress as Rahul Gandhi can become Prime Minister even if he wishes now," Thirunavukkarasar, who was earlier with the BJP, said.

Congress would forge the right alliance at the time of elections and would return to power, he asserted.