On October 2, PM Narendra Modi had launched the Clean India campaign.
At his rally in Kolhapur today, Prime Minister Narendra Modi ripped apart the Congress allegations of his appropriating the legacy of Mahatma Gandhi,saying it was the Congress that deserted Gandhi and what they need are "currency notes, carrying pictures of the Mahatma".
"I have read in newspapers that the Congress says I've taken away Gandhiji from them," the Prime Minister said. "I wouldn't dare snatch away Gandhiji from anyone. It is they who have deserted Gandhiji (the Mahatma's principles)," he said.
On October 2, the birth anniversary of the Mahatma, PM Modi had launched the ambitious new countrywide campaign for a cleaner India. "A clean India is the best tribute we can pay to Bapu on his 150th birth anniversary in 2019," he had said. The Congress had hit back, saying the BJP was merely paying lip service to the Mahatma.
Today, the Prime Minister took on the Congress over the question. (Read:
Silent on Sena Out of Respect for Balasaheb)
Back in 1925, on January 1, Mahatma Gandhi had launched a charkha ashram from "this very ground," he said in Kolhapur's Kalamba. "But no charkha ashram can be seen anywhere in Kolhapur". The Congress, he said never took the project forward.
"They had perpetuated a fraud on Gandhi. So who deserted the Mahatma? The only place they like Gandhi in are currency notes, without which their politics and their very life would come to a standstill," he said.