JNU row govt tactic to divert attention: Congress

The JNU row is a diversionary tactics to ensure that a corruption scandal in Gujarat should not get highlighted, viewed the Congress leaders.

The BJP is going aggressive on the alleged controversial slogans raised by JNU students on the basis of questionable video tapes, but its real intention is that a corruption scandal in Gujarat should not be discussed at the national level, Congress MPs feel.

The unrest in university campuses and the government’s strategy to suppress students’ voices as seen in the FTII, Pune, IIT-Madrass, Hyderabad Central University and JNU will affect the BJP’s youth constituency which had voted for Narendra Modi in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections.

Responding to a question on the BJP labelling Congressmen as anti-national for standing with those students who are supporting Afzal Guru, the Leader of Opposition in Rajya Sabha Ghulam Nabi Azad told reporters, “Those who are calling us anti-national, first I will ask them — are they nationalists If they are, who has given them the certificate Any person who calls another person or any Indian who calls another Indian anti-national, starts the anti-national act right there because he or she is sowing the seeds of anti-nationalism.”

Meanwhile, Assam CM Tarun Gogoi criticised the Centre for its “mishandling” of the ongoing JNU row saying the way the Delhi police was acting, thousands of people would have to be put behind bars under the sedition law in Assam.

“They are completely mishandling the JNU issue. If the way the police is handling the issue (is followed), thousands of people in Assam would have to be arrested under the sedition law,” he said at a press conference here.

Mr Gogoi said it was very common in Assam to deliver inflammatory speeches which one can term as “anti-national”.

“But things do not work like that. You can’t arrest everyone on sedition charges. You have to be rational,” he said.