PM Narendra Modi has left Subramanian Swamy off with a taunt, ducked charges: Congress

NEW DELHI: Leader of the Opposition Ghulam Nabi Azad has come out with a rebuttal to the political and policy positioning PM Narendra Modi has taken during his Times Now interview. Azad has accused Modi of avoiding reining in the ‘polarising agents’ in BJP and limiting himself with treating Subramanian Swamy with “a mild scolding”. Azad has also charged the PM with conducting the foreign policy in a manner that “India has lost out” with its strategic partners as well in dealing with Pakistan.

About PM’s response to Swamy, Azad said, “Modi treated him the way a mother mildly scolds her erring child. Instead of responding to Swamy’s pointed charge that RBI had flouted banks-licensing laws, PM only talked about RBI chief’s patriotism.”

Commenting on the PM asking why media make “heroes” of those BJP leaders making communally rabid statements, Azad quipped, “PM Modi basically told the media to shut up and let those BJP leaders making communal remarks carry on. PM also said he doesn’t recognise them on TV. How can the PM doesn’t know who is Sakshi Maharaj, Adityanath?”

On Pakistan policy, Azad said, “PM Modi conducted talks with Pakistan PM several times. But what did we get? In J&K, we are back to the ’90s.” Claiming NDA complicated ties with China, Russia and Nepal, the Congress leaders said: “The more PM Modi meets Chinese leaders, the worse our ties get with them as we saw on NSG. Russia was our trusted ally, for the first time supplied warplanes to Pakistan. We know what has happened with Nepal.”