Hyderabad: In a rare moment of solidarity between the BRS and the Congress, Telangana chief minister K Chandrashekhar Rao condemned Rahul Gandhi’s disqualification from Lok Sabha and called it a ‘black day’ for Indian democracy.
“It is the height of arrogance and dictatorship of Narendra Modi,” he said.
“It is condemnable that the Modi government is not only misusing constitutional institutions but also using the highest democratic platform, Parliament, for its heinous activities,” he said.
“Bad days have come for democracy and constitutional values. Modi’s rule has even surpassed the Emergency. Tormenting opposition leaders has become the new normal. Modi bought his own destruction by disqualifying opposition leaders for the sake of criminals, and fraudsters,” he remarked.
KCR also called for unity among the opposition in condemning Rahul Gandhi’s disqualification. ‘It is not the time for differences among parties. For the sake of preserving democracy, and constitutional values, all democracy believers should condemn this act. BJP’s cruel ways must be resisted,” he said.
Telangana IT minister KT Rama Rao also condemned the call to disqualify Rahul Gandhi as a Lok Sabha MP after his conviction in a criminal defamation case from 2019.
“Disqualification of @RahulGandhi Ji is a blatant misinterpretation of Constitution The hastiness showed in this issue is highly undemocratic I condemn this!” he tweeted along with a quote from French philosopher Voltaire on Freedom of Expression and ‘First they came..’ poem written by German Lutheran pastor Martin Niemöller on Nazi Germany.
By condemning the disqualification, the BRS leaders joined many other opposition leaders from across the country who spoke up against the development.
“Shri Rahul Gandhi, Member of Lok Sabha representing the Wayanad Parliamentary Constituency of Kerala stands disqualified from the membership of Lok Sabha from the date of his conviction i.e. 23 March, 2023 in terms of the provisions of Article 102(1)(e) of the Constitution of India read with Section 8 of the Representation of the People Act, 1951,” the Lok Sabha secretariat said in a notification issued on Friday.
Congress MP Jairam Ramesh said that the party will not be intimidated or silenced by the decision to disqualify the Wayanad MP.
