Rahul Gandhi slams Prime Minister in his first speech as President

Yesterday was a glorious day for the Congress Party as Rahul Gandhi was elected as its 49th President, and gave his first speech as the president.

In his first address as Congress President, Rahul Gandhi on Saturday said Prime Minister Narendra Modi is taking India back to the medieval times.

Addressing the gathering of Congress leaders and party workers at the party headquarters here, Rahul said, “Congress took India to 21st century, but the Prime Minister (Narendra Modi) is taking us backwards, to medieval times, where people are being butchered because of who they are, beaten for what they believe and killed for what they eat,” Rahul Gandhi said, attacking PM Modi and the government in his first speech as Congress boss.

“Foreign policy is in tatters, everything is subservient to one leader, his personal image…they can only defeat us if we back down, we have to stand up to them, the Congress won’t back down.”

Switching between English and Hindi, text and extempore, he said: “The BJP is spreading hatred and communalism. They break, while we unite. They ignite the fire, we put it out. They break, we join….”

He called himself an “idealist” and signaled that he wanted to try a different kind of politics. “We even consider the BJP as our brothers and sisters, because we want to be inclusive,” he said.

He said only the Congress and its workers can put a stop at what the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) led government is doing to this country.

“And if there is anyone who can stop what the BJP is doing, it is the ‘pyara karyakarta & neta’ (leader and workers) of Congress. We are going to make Congress, grand old and young party. We will fight the politics of anger,” Rahul asserted.

Earlier, Rahul Gandhi took over as Congress president by succeeding his mother Sonia Gandhi.

The 47-year-old was officially made the party chief in a ceremony held at the party’s 24 Akbar Road headquarters here.

He was given the certificate of Congress president by Mullappally Ramachandran, the chairman of the party’s central election authority, who oversaw the organizational polls.

The ceremony was attended by party stalwarts, his mother, and outgoing Congress President Sonia Gandhi, former prime minister Manmohan Singh, former union home minister Sushil Kumar Shinde, former Maharashtra chief minister Ashok Chavan and other party leaders.

His sister Priyanka Gandhi and brother-in-law Robert Vadra were also present on the occasion.