Chennai:Given his retrograde right wing RSS background, Prime Minister Narendra Modi was seemingly opposed to women’s progress, which was exemplified by his recent campaign against the State Government’s scheme providing free bus travel for women by falsely citing it as a reason for the ‘lowering’ of patronage for the Metro Rail, Chief Minister M K Stalin said on Saturday.
Taking strong exception to the Prime Minister’s remarks that free bus travel prevented people from using the Metro Rail, Stalin, in a message, clarified that the trips made by Chennai Metro Rail had only gone up from 3.28 crore trips in 2019 to 9.11 crore in 2023, pointing to an enhanced use of Metro Rail services now, which was quite contrary to what Modi was now erroneously claiming.
It was for implementing the free bus travel scheme that he had put in his first signature as Chief Minister after the DMK government assumed office and the scheme had gone a long way in giving an impetus to crores of women to progress in life as it gave them the freedom and mobility while Modi was unabashedly spreading lies to run down the scheme, Stalin said.
Also objecting to Modi’s recent hate speeches peppered with lies, he said the people were watching in shock and agony the making of such reckless pronouncements and the silence of the Election Commission of India that should have stopped him from indulging in such false propaganda.
As one fully into a hate campaign, in a bid to divide the people, Modi had not spoken anything on the demand to raise the 50 per cent ceiling on reservation for Scheduled Castes and Tribes and Other Backward Classes, though it would help people of Uttar Pradesh, too, in a big way, he pointed out.
Though the demand by the people Tamil Nadu and the political parties committed to the cause of social justice in the State for raising the 50 per cent ceiling on reservation had gained ground in the country with more parties of the INDIA coalition supporting it, had Modi given any guarantee on that, he asked and added that he was only spreading hatred in the country.
After realizing that his hate campaign had not had the desired effect on the people, Modi was resorting to cheap politics by seeking to create a rift between the States by untruthfully claiming that south Indian leaders were speaking ill of the people of Uttar Pradesh, he said and referred to earlier bids using BJP-backed Youtuber Manish Kayshup to spread lies about migrant workers being attacked in Tamil Nadu.
Apart from the failure of his sustained hate campaign, Modi was unable to tell the people what the achievements of his government in the past 10 years were and was hence targeting the States ruled by opposition parties and it was in tune with that he had spoken about the free bus travel facility provided for women by the DMK government, Stalin said.
