Rahul leads Congress protest in Parliament over Hegde's remark

Congress President Rahul Gandhi on Thursday led a protest in the Parliament over Union Minister Anant Kumar Hegde's "amend the Constitution" remarks as the party said "there is a systematic sinister attack on the Constitution, its ethos and the value system by BJP and RSS".

All Congress MPs joined Gandhi in the protest over Hegde's remark.

"The Congress Party's protest today (Thursday) was on a systematic sinister attack on the Constitution, Constitutional ethos and the value system

"..as also an attack on the rights of the oppressed and downtrodden sections of the populace that is being systematically engineered by BJP, RSS and their ministers," said Congress spokesperson Randeep Singh Surjewal.

Surjewala said the statement of the Minister should not be treated as an isolated instance.

"None less than RSS Chief Mohan Bhagwat had advocated abolition of reservation. The Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe sub-plan which is part of the 'Jadav Committee' has been abolished by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his government.

"The backlog of Scheduled Caste vacancies is at 93 per cent high, the recruitment of members of SC, OBCs and STs in the government jobs has gone down by 80 per cent. The Scheduled Caste schemes have been drastically reduced by over a 100 per cent," he added.

Surjewala also said the rights of the oppressed and downtrodden are being diluted and the ultimate dilution being the attack on the reservation.

"Congress was protesting against the same. Many other political parties joined us inside the Parliament yesterday.

"We will carry all opposition parties, every individual and every political group who believes that the ethos of the Constitution and the rights of the oppressed classes cannot be compromised," said Surjewala.

--IANS

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