Lok Sabha LoP and Congress MP Rahul Gandhi and celebration president Mallikarjun Kharge communicate to the media after attending the all-party assembly convened by the central authorities, in New Delhi. File.
| Picture Credit score: ANI
The shifting Congress responses to the Pahalgam terror attack, wherein 26 individuals have been killed in Jammu and Kashmir’s (J&Okay) most popular tourist destination, gives perception into the fragile balancing act the celebration has to carry out on delicate points like nationalism and terrorism.
Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge, a day after the Pahalgam assault, said, “This isn’t a time for partisan politics.”
Editorial | Sent messages: On Jammu and Kashmir post Pahalgam terror attack
However the Congress Working Committee (CWC) nuanced this stance, balancing assist for the federal government’s place on Pakistan with a name for accountability.
“It’s crucial {that a} complete evaluation is carried out into the intelligence failures and safety lapses that enabled such an assault in a Union Territory — an space straight underneath the purview of the Union Dwelling Ministry,” the CWC decision mentioned.
Chief of the Opposition in Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi, at an all-party meeting chaired by Defence Minister Rajnath Singh on Pahalgam assault on April 24, asserted that it was “sheer luck that the variety of individuals killed have been beneath 30 and extra individuals didn’t get massacred”.
The celebration additionally didn’t struggle shy in clearly stating the victims were identified and killed on the basis of their faith. “The deliberate concentrating on of Hindus was achieved to inflame passions throughout the nation,”the CWC famous.
Unwilling to painting the fear assault in Hindu-Muslim binary, the CWC decision identified how each the individuals of Jammu and Kashmir and the regional events condemned the assaults and paid respects to the native guides and pony-owners, one of them “died while selflessly trying to protect the tourists to uphold the thought of India”.
“Nevertheless, it’s surprising that the BJP is exploiting this grave tragedy by means of official and proxy social media platforms to sow additional discord, distrust, polarization, and division at a time when unity and solidarity are most wanted,”the CWC famous.
In contrast to the BJP’s mix of Hindutva and rashtravad (nationalism), the Congress celebration’s thought of nationalism doesn’t inherently deal with any spiritual or cultural identification.
“The thought of nationalism for Congress is one which binds individuals collectively. Alternatively, the pseudo-nationalism of the BJP-RSS seeks to divide society and our individuals,” the decision, adopted on the Ahmedabad session of the All India Congress Committee (AICC) on April 9, said.
The Congress doesn’t affiliate extremism or terrorism with a selected neighborhood or faith. For years, the celebration has maintained that terrorists haven’t any faith and has consciously prevented utilizing phrases like “Islamic terror” or “jihad” in its official communications.
This place has typically led the BJP to accuse the Congress of being “tender on terror” on account of what it describes as appeasement politics.
Through the 26/11 assaults in Mumbai in 2008, Narendra Modi—then Chief Minister of Gujarat—held a press convention exterior the Trident Resort whereas anti-terror operations have been nonetheless ongoing. “The nation wants a authorities that acts, not one which watches whereas terrorists strike at will,” Mr Modi mentioned on November 28.
With a number of terror assaults going down in the course of the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance (UPA) regime, and media narratives portray the Manmohan Singh authorities as “weak and indecisive,” the label of being “tender on terror” caught to the Congress.
In sharp distinction, the Modi authorities not solely conveyed a way of decisiveness by means of actions just like the Balakot air raids and surgical strikes however, with the assist with a big part of the media, succeeded in crafting a story that questioning the federal government after a terror strike is equal to questioning the Indian state itself.
That framing has left the Congress performing a fragile act — demonstrating nationwide solidarity whereas holding the federal government accountable, and retaining its ideological dedication to inclusive nationalism in an more and more polarized political panorama.
Printed – April 27, 2025 10:26 am IST
