Opposition slams the crackdown on young protestorsNEW DELHI: Congress leader Rahul Gandhi slammed PM Narendra Modi as the “most anti-youth PM India has ever had”, as the opposition jointly condemned the ruling BJP for the crackdown on “paper leak” protest march to Parliament Monday.Rahul said the young protesters are not criminals and Modi should accept their legitimate demands. “It is disgusting what the govt and the police are doing. Teargassing and lathicharging the students is not India’s way … all they believe in is ‘asatya’ and ‘hinsa’ which are anti-Indian principles,” he said in a video statement, adding, “Modi disrespects all the young people of this country.” He also said there is general outrage against RSS having captured the education system.After crackdown on young protestors, Rahul warned police officers that they will be held accountable. “Peaceful protest is a sacred and fundamental right. Every police officer and govt official blindly following orders to attack India’s innocent students should keep in mind – The Constitution is your master,” he said.Opposition’s Mallikarjun Kharge, Akhilesh Yadav (SP), Mamata Banerjee (TMC), Arvind Kejriwal (AAP), Dipankar Bhattacharya (CPI-ML), K C Venugopal, Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, Shashi Tharoor (Congress), N K Premachandran (RSP), D Raja (CPI), CPI (M), lashed out at the Modi govt for police action. Congress MP Renuka Chowdhury, CPI (M) general secretary M A Baby, SP MPs Dimple Yadav, Dharmendra Yadav, Iqra Hasan, Zia Ur Rahman Barq, Pushpendra Saroj, Chhote Lal, Rajiv Rai among others joined the protest near Parliament and Jantar Mantar.The full-blown attack came after anti-BJP parties hammered out a consensus on supporting the NEET protest on the opening day of the monsoon session of Parliament. In the meeting of the opposition parties Monday morning, sources said Congress and SP pushed for “Ayodhya donation scam” as the opening salvo against the ruling BJP. A senior leader is also said to have called the Cockroach Janata Party an RSS platform. But, sources said, other parties argued that they had to associate themselves with the youth march to Parliament.With the state action against students coupled with viral visuals dominating the headlines, Shiv Sena’s Sanjay Raut said the “paper leak issue” and “Ayodhya donation scam” will dominate Parliament in the coming days – in what seems an ominous sign for the initial days of proceedings in Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha.Tharoor said the govt should allow some discussions being demanded by the opposition, and the latter will allow the bills to be taken up. “There has got to be give and take. That is the way Parliament is supposed to function,” he said.Akhilesh Yadav said the large youth turnout proves the failure of the BJP regime in conducting NEET and other examinations.Priyanka Gandhi, rebuking the govt for police action, said, “It’s ridiculous…They are our own children… they are the future of the country. This Parliament belongs to them. It’s no one’s personal fiefdom.”Dimple Yadav, who met the protesters, said, “This will be remembered as a black day. The youngsters came unarmed but faced lathis, were given electric shocks (taser). We saw bleeding heads.”DMK MP Kanimozhi dubbed protest as the most democratic form of expressing the people’s opinion. “There have been valid questions. Unfortunately, the govt does not want to answer the questions, and resorted to violence against the people raising the questions. This is unacceptable.”
