NEW DELHI: Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge on Monday alleged that Prime Minister Narendra Modi had been asking for more than 400 seats in the Lok Sabha elections, so that the Indian Constitution, which ensures social justice and secularism, could be changed.
Kharge’s attack came after BJP MP Anantkumar Hegde, at a gathering in Karwar in Karnataka on Saturday, said the party needed a two-thirds majority in both Houses of Parliament to amend the Constitution and “set right the distortions and unnecessary additions made to it by the Congress”.
“The Indian Constitution needs to be changed ‘to save our religion’ and the only way the BJP can do it is if the party wins over 400 seats in the upcoming Lok Sabha elections,” Hegde said. The BJP, however, distanced itself from the controversial remark and dubbed Hegde’s statement as his personal opinion and even sought clarification.
Addressing a press conference at the party headquarters here, the Congress president said, “I feel sad that the BJP has not accepted the Constitution completely. On one side, Prime Minister Modi says that the Constitution will never change, and on the other he makes his people say that to change the Constitution a two-thirds majority will be required. The comment was not made by any fringe element. It was made by an MP,” Kharge said.
The Congress leader said BJP and its parent organisation, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), were against social justice, secularism and reservation.