Kolkata: Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari on Sunday had slammed Congress Parliamentary Party chairperson Sonia Gandhi for disrespecting Vande Mataram at the Congress headquarters on Independence Day.
Accusing the Congress for indulging in ‘appeasement politics’, Adhikari asked the Congress to ‘apologize’ from the people.
“Enter Bengal is fuming as Congress has disrespected Rishi Bankim Chandra Chatterjee. This is an insult to nationalism. The people of India have seen this. As a Chief Minister of Bengal I am condemning this act,” added Adhikari from the state secretariat Nabanna.
The demand for apology came after Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Naihati MLA Sumitro Chatterjee also a relative of Rishi Bankim Chandra Chatterjee, had written a letter to both Sonia Gandhi and Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge demanding an apology.
Talking to the media, Sumitro said that he and his entire family was hurt seeing the Congress disrespecting Bankim Chandra Chatterjee.
“At one point it seemed she wanted to stop the song. We later heard she was asking for a chair for Khargeji,” said the BJP MLA.
Demanding apology from both Gandhi and Kharge, the BJP MLA in his letter had written, “Vande Mataram is not merely a mantra, but a religion of love for the country. Martyrs like Khudiram Bose embraced death inspired by this mantra. It is not the property of any political party but a collective memory of an entire race.”
