New Delhi: The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Wednesday alleged that an opportunist Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi is trying to score some political brownie points out of a very tragic incident in the University of Hyderabad.
BJP spokesperson Sambit Patra said the Congress and other political parties have become politically bankrupt now, adding that their move to play politics over the Dalit scholar’s suicide was a testimony to the fact.
“The way certain politicians, including Rahul Gandhi, has tried to buy some political brownie point out of it only points to the political bankruptcy that Congress and these political parties have run into,” Patra told ANI.
“Let’s remind Rahul Gandhi of the very fact that it’s the same University where nine Dalit students had committed suicide in the past ten years. Where was Rahul Gandhi then? Why was Rahul Gandhi not speaking about these issues then? Today he is trying to score some political brownie point out of a very tragic incident and this is what reeks of opportunism,” he added.
Resonating similar sentiments, another BJP leader Siddharth Nath Singh said the leaders of various political parties are visiting the Hyderabad University not for humanity or Dalit cause, but for their own political interests.
“They have no interest on the Dalit cause or humanity as such. If they had, I may ask all of them, including the TMC leaders, Arvind Kejriwal, Rahul Gandhi and also Sitaram Yechury…what happened in May 2015 when three Dalits were shot by the TMC leaders in Nadia district of West Bengal? Nobody went there. Why did not anybody go to Kaliachak? It was a national security issue,” he added.
The Congress vice-president, who visited the University of Hyderabad yesterday, said that the varsity Vice Chancellor Appa Rao and Union Minister Bandaru Dattatreya created the situation that made Rohith Vemula, a Dalit scholar studying there, kill himself.
“I agree with the students here. Rohith committed suicide but the conditions for his suicide were created by the VC and the minister,” Gandhi said.
Rohith Vemula, who belonged to Guntur district of Amravati, was found hanging in his hostel room on Sunday. He was doing his PhD in science technology and society studies for the past two years.
The protests escalated yesterday over Rohith’s suicide with activists demonstrating outside the residence of Dattatreya, who has been accused of abetment of the Dalit scholar’s suicide and demanded his resignation. (ANI)