By Andalib Akhter, TwoCircles.net,
New Delhi: The Indian National Congress has promised to give reservation to minorities in employment and education at the national level. The party manifesto for the Lok Sabha election 2009 released by party Chief Sonia Gandhi and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh jointly today says that economic growth and communal harmony, and economic growth and social justice, are two sides of the same coin and must always go hand-in-hand.
“The Indian National Congress has pioneered reservations for minorities in Kerala, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh in government employment and education on the basis of their social and economic backwardness. We are committed to adopt this policy at the national level”, says the Work Programme 2009-2014 of the of the congress manifesto.
It also promised to establish a ‘Wakf Development Corporation’ for the development of the Wakf properties. Establishment of National Unani University and doubling of the corpus of the Maulana Azad Educational Foundation are other promise congress has made for the minorities.
The manifesto said that the Indian National Congress was irrevocably committed to ensuring that the constitutional rights of all minorities are protected fully, that the representation of minorities in public administration increases substantially, and that minorities recognize that the government is working for their welfare at all times.
Meanwhile Prime Minister Manmohan Singh today described Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) prime ministerial candidate L.K. Advani as an ‘opportunist’ and said his only contribution to ‘national welfare’ was his role in the demolition of the Babri Masjid.
‘Only ‘prominent role’ the BJP leader had played was in the 1992 razing of the Babri mosque in Ayodhya that triggered widespread Hindu-Muslim violence’, the prime minister said in a reply to a question by media person after the release of the manifesto.
‘What has he done to the contribution of national welfare?’ the prime minister asked.
‘When he was the home minister, the (terrorist) attack on parliament took place,’ he said, adding that it led to a massive mobilisation of troops on the Pakistan border.
‘Without getting any results, we rolled them back. Parliament was attacked, Red Fort was attacked (by terrorists), an Indian Airlines plane was hijacked and terrorists were rewarded (by releasing them). This is the record of Advani.’
‘He was the home minister who presided over the massacre (of innocents) in Gujarat. This country must reflect if he is fit to hold the post of prime minister.’
Manmohan Singh went on to say that Advani, widely seen as a Hindu hardliner, ‘was opportunist enough when he went to Pakistan. There he suddenly discovered new virtues in Mohammed Ali Jinnah. When he came back, his party disowned him, his masters in the RSS (Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh) and many of his colleagues (disowned him)’, prime minister said sarcastically.