Ahmedabad(IANS) : The Congress Friday accused the Narendra Modi government in Gujarat of failing to protect the lives and property of Muslims and not doing anything for the rehabilitation of the 2002 riot-affected Muslim families.
The Congress criticism is contained in a ‘charge sheet’ against the Bharatiya Janata Party government.
This is for the first time after the Gujarat riots of 2002 that the party has adopted an aggressive stance on communal issues in Gujarat.
Till now, it had touched the issue in a guarded and selective manner under fear of losing Hindu support.
Releasing the charge sheet, Congress leader Manish Tewari said it was needed to expose the lies being told by the BJP to the people of the state.
The document begins with, “BJP rule in Gujarat in the last five years can be described briefly in a single word – canards.”
In a section on the plight of the victims of the 2002 riots, the Congress said: “The riot affected Muslims are still in the most miserable condition. The state government has offered them less than a pittance.”
“It is a very sad state of affairs that a constitutionally bound state government has grossly failed in protecting the lives and property of Muslim citizens and it believes that its only duty is fulfilled by passing on the central government assistance to riot-affected people,” the document says.
The party has also accused the state government of not fully utilising the Rs.1.5-billion central assistance for rehabilitation of Muslim victims and had returned Rs.190 million to the central government.
“It is shocking that the riot affected families have been deliberately pushed to the category of Above Poverty Line,” the Congress has said. The party has also criticized the Modi government for its delay in announcing rewards for two Muslim cricketers from the state after India won the world Twenty20 cricket title.
Tewari said: “If the government claims that Gujarat is number one state in the country, then why is it that 25 percent of its population continues to live below the poverty line?”
He said that in the last 10 years Gujarat has been able to attract only five percent foreign investment into India. He claimed that the central government has come forward to invest Rs.1.4 trillion in the state.
State Congress president Bharatsinh Solanki said the BJP government has failed to provide proper educational and professional avenues to the people.