Congress MP Shashi Tharoor (Express Archive) Congress MP Shashi Tharoor (Express Archive)

Congress leader and Thiruvananthapuram MP Shashi Tharoor said on Wednesday that if the BJP goes on to mark a repeat of their current strength in the Lok Sabha in 2019, then it will pave the way for the tearing up of the Indian constitution and result in the creation of a ‘Hindu Pakistan’. The comments came while he was addressing a lecture on ‘Threats faced by Indian democracy and secularism’ in the state capital. Tharoor stated that three factors stand in the way of the BJP to follow through on what their heroes like Veer Savarkar dreamed of with respect to a new constitution.

“So far, what they have been preventing them is three things — two-thirds majority in the Lok Sabha, two-thirds in the Rajya Sabha and half of the states. As you know, they have two-thirds in Lok Sabha and they have more than half the states. They have 20 states and coalitions in two others. The only thing they don’t have is a majority in the Rajya Sabha but because they have so many state governments and because state assemblies elect the Rajya Sabha, you can be sure in 4-5 years, they will have a majority in Rajya Sabha as well,” he said.

He continued, “So the great danger then is that if they are able to win a repeat of their current strength in the Lok Sabha, then frankly our democratic constitution as we understand will not survive because they will have all the three elements they need to tear up the Constitution of India and write a new one. That will be a new one which will enshrine the principle of Hindu Rashtra, will remove equality for minorities, that will create a Hindu Pakistan. That’s not what Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru, Sardar Patel and the great heroes of our freedom struggle fought for.”

Reacting to Tharoor’s statement, Union Minister Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore told ANI: “This is pure hallucination by Shashi Tharoor, I think this is withdrawal symptoms of the fact that neither they are in power nor do they see power coming to them again. It’s Congress that has infringed our Constitution&freedom of our citizens.”

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