The Karnataka BJP has slammed Congress over the display of posters depicting a map of India at the venue of the centenary celebrations of the INC’s 1924 session in Belagavi. The map shows India without some parts of Kashmir.
Taking to social media handle X on Thursday, the BJP said, “Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK) has been handed over to Pakistan by the Indian National Congress - Karnataka! It is truly an act of treason that Congress members have distorted India's map in the name of Gandhi Bharat. The banners displayed in Belagavi stand as proof that Congress is "ready" to engage in any vile act for personal gain and appeasement politics. Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, please immediately remove these controversial banners and take action against the traitors who distorted the map of India.”
Minister for IT and BT Priyank Kharge said that those banners were not the official ones put up by the party. “Just because a private person puts up banners with our leaders’ faces on it, doesn’t make them official. In the official banners put up by the party, there is no map. A logo of a company is visible on the banners. Admirers of the party may have put banners but that does not mean we endorse them.”
Karnataka Congress chief and Deputy Chief Minister DK Shivakumar said that some leaders may have put up the posters by mistake and that they would remove the posters.
The Congress party is celebrating the centenary event of Mahatma Gandhi taking over as the Congress President in a session held at Belagavi in 1924 to launch the Independence struggle. The grand old party is geared up for mega celebrations scheduled to be held on December 26 and 27.
The party is holding a 'Jai Bapu, Jai Bhim, Jai Samvidhan' rally along with the extended Congress Working Committee meeting as part of centenary celebrations over two days.
The Congress has declared the area where MK Gandhi presided at the historical INC meeting in Belagavi as the Mahatma Gandhi Nagar. On December 26, the Congress Working Committee meeting will be held near Gandhi Well, also known as Pampa Sarovar.
In 1924, during the Belagavi Congress session, MK Gandhi presided over the event. Karnataka leaders Gangadhar Deshpande and former PM late Jawaharlal Nehru, then the Congress General Secretaries, organised that session in Belagavi on an 80-acre ground. Presently, the Congress is conducting the working committee meeting in the same location.
Leader of Opposition (LoP) in Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi, Congress MPs Priyanka Gandhi Vadra and Sonia Gandhi, members of the party's working committee, current and former Chief Ministers from various states, leaders of legislative parties, State Congress Committee presidents, MPs, MLAs, party workers from across the state, and the general public are participating in the event.
The records of the 1924 session have been collected and the party has announced that a book will be released in this regard on December 26.
On December 27, at 10.30 a.m., the statue of Gandhi at Suvarna Soudha will be unveiled by Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge and the LoP Rahul Gandhi.
(With inputs from IANS)