Modi-led alliance cannot accept divergent views, plurality: Cong

Taking potshots at the BJP soon after the TDP pulled out its ministers from the NDA government, the Congress today alleged that the "parochial autocratic alliance" led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi could not accept a "divergence of opinions or plurality".
Congress communications in-charge Randeep Surjewala said that one after the other, BJP's allies were breaking their ties with the party and added that "all was never well within the NDA".
"Drunk with power and over-confidence, the Modi Government has little place for those who dissent either from within or from outside and the present disintegration of the NDA is a reflection of that," he told reporters here.

"The parochial autocratic alliance led by Narendra Modi could never accept a divergence of opinions or plurality which is the essence of Indias foundational values and the splintering of the NDA that you are seeing now is only a reflection of that philosophy of the PM and the BJP. And it does not start or end here," he said.
Surjewala said the BJP's oldest ally, the Shiv Sena, had already declared that it would have no truck with the ruling party under Modi, while the Biju Janata Dal (BJD) had left the alliance a while ago.
He said the Janata Dal (U) "dumped them and remarried them" for the "compulsions" of Nitish Kumar.

"This Talaq, marriage and possible Talaq has to be explained by them (the BJP)," he said. But it also showed how the TDP's opinion was not being accepted by the NDA, he added.

"The TDP is perhaps the oldest ally of the NDA as N Chandrababu Naidu used to be the convener of the NDA," he said, adding that Naidu showed "the courage of his conviction or so to call a spade a spade" in speaking out when Modi was the chief minister of Gujarat.
Andhra chief minister Naidu has now seen the futility of continuing in a coalition which has only "disrespect and humiliation" for the alliance partner and which seeks to "trample upon the rights of Andhra Pradesh and the solemn promise of hand holding made to them at the time of the state's division", he said.

Surjewala said before coming to power Modi used to talk about cooperative federalism, but once he became the prime minister, cooperative federalism had turned into a unilateral rule.
To a question on whether the Congress was looking at the opportunity of finding a new ally in the TDP, Surjewala said his party did not believe in creating a rift within a family.
He, however, did not answer whether the TDP had been invited to the March 13 dinner hosted by Congress Parliamentary Party chairperson Sonia Gandhi.
The Congress reactions came after two TDP ministers in the NDA government submitted their resignations to Modi today. Their resignations came a day after TDP chief and Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Naidu announced that the party's ministers would quit the central government in protest against its refusal to grant a special category status to the state.