At Chennai event, Rahul Gandhi says PM Narendra Modi silencing voices

Tamil Nadu Chief Minister C Joseph Vijay and Lok Sabha Leader of Opposition Rahul Gandhi in Chennai on Saturday. (PTI)

Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Saturday said in Chennai that “Mogambo Modi” is destroying India’s democracy. The Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha also accused Prime Minister Narendra Modi of indulging in “vote chori”.

“PM Modi is silencing voices; as you saw in Delhi, the entire city was shut down, and police were beating students. The BJP also unleashed its goondas who beat up students,” Gandhi said at the sixth edition of his youth outreach initiative, ‘Chhatron Ki Goonj’, which was earlier held in Kota, Dehradun, Prayagraj, Pune and Indore.

“The problem is, Mr Modi does not understand that the game is over. The drama that he has been doing for the past 15 years is coming to an end. We will ensure that Modi pays for the crimes he has committed against the country,” he said.

“Mogambo Modi” is destroying India’s democracy, he said, referring to the villain from the Bollywood film, Mr India. As Gandhi delivered the line, the screen behind him played a scene from the 1987 movie with Modi’s face superimposed on Amrish Puri. He said his message to students is that they should not fear anything, stressing that all those who attacked the Constitution and democracy will be brought to justice.

Gandhi also alleged that Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah have launched a “full-scale attack” on Tamil culture, language and history. “Amit Shah openly says that Hindi will be imposed on Tamil Nadu. It is Modi and Shah who are stifling curiosity. This is happening through the New Education Policy; a three-language formula has been imposed,” he said.

Claiming that Tamil Nadu is being punished through the design of delimitation, he said, “We won’t allow Modi to attack Tamil culture, language and history.”

Meets CM Vijay

Earlier in the day, Gandhi had lunch with Chief Minister C Joseph Vijay. Gandhi arrived at Chennai airport around 12.30 pm and travelled to Vijay’s Neelankarai residence. This was his most significant political engagement in Tamil Nadu after a long period in which his appearances in a state once central to Congress’s national Opposition strategy had become strikingly rare.

Story continues below this ad

A day after hosting Gandhi, Vijay is scheduled to appear with Prime Minister Narendra Modi on October 11 for the inauguration of the first operational stretch of Chennai Metro Phase II – their first joint public appearance since Vijay became CM.

The programme is administrative, with Modi set to inaugurate the 14.64-km Poonamallee-Vadapalani stretch and travel with Vijay by Metro from Poonamallee to Porur. But its political optics are difficult to separate from the event. For Modi, travelling beside one of Tamil Nadu’s most popular political figures provides a powerful public frame in a state where BJP has struggled to acquire one of its own. For Vijay, the sequence is equally striking. Lunch with the principal national Opposition leader Saturday, a Metro ride with the PM Sunday, the obligations of governing place him physically beside the two poles of national politics.