New Delhi, August 21: Senior Congress leader and former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Monday lambasted the Modi government, saying that some “disturbing trends” witnessed in India over the past few years and perpetrated by certain groups can only hurt national interests. While addressing a function where the ‘Rajiv Gandhi Sadbhavna Award’ was conferred on former West Bengal Governor Gopalkrishna Gandhi, Singh stressed the need to arrest the trends that are ‘anathema to the promotion of peace, national integration and communal harmony’. Also Read - Sonia Gandhi Returns With Son Rahul From US Post Health Check-up Amid Ongoing Monsoon Session

“They are anathema to the promotion of peace, national integration and communal harmony, which are the cherished objectives enshrined in our magnificent Constitution. All of us perhaps need to pause and reflect on how we can go together and contribute to arresting these trends,” said the former PM. Also Read - In Absence of Sonia And Rahul, Congress Leaders to Meet Tomorrow to Discuss Organisational Issues

Echoing similar sentiments, UPA chairperson and former Congress president Sonia Gandhi also launched an indirect attack on Narendra Modi-led Centre by calling for a resolution to fight forces of “divisiveness, hate and bigotry” in the country. Also Read - Sonia Gandhi, Son Rahul to Miss Monsoon Session of Parliament For Few Days

“The ideologies that reject the “composite essence of our nationhood” must be opposed and there was a need to fight the forces of divisiveness, hate and bigotry,” Sonia said.

She also showered praise on the late former PM and said,”Though his political career was a brief one but he gave a new direction to our economy. He led the foundations for India’s entry into the 21st century with his focus on Information Technology, Telecommunications, and computers. He almost single-handedly changed the structure of our polity, by the constitutional empowerment of Panchayats and Nagar Palikas through reservation for women.”