Within days after its workers took out a morcha to the official residence of the house of leader of the Opposition Devendra Fadnavis of the BJP at Malabar Hill in south Mumbai, the Maharashtra Congress said on Thursday that its workers would write thousands of letters to Prime Minister Narendra Modi to demand the latter’s apology for accusing the people of Covid-19 in northern parts of the country.
The State Congress, which has been protesting ever since Modi had-- in his speech made in Lok Sabha on February 7 – charged that the Maharashtra government had contributed to the spread of Covid-19 infection during wave period –reiterated that the Prime minister had “insulted” the people of Maharashtra by calling them the “spreaders” of the Covid-19 in northern states of the country.
Talking to media persons at the Gandhi Bhavan, Maharashtra Congress President Nana Patole said that his party would launch the next phase of its agitation to demand the Prime Minister for "insulting" people of the state through "false" accusations made in Lok Sabha. “As part of that agitation, our party workers will send thousands of letters to Modi through Leader of the Opposition in the state Devendra Fadnavis, asking him to apologise to Maharashtra on Shiv Jayanti Day,” Patole said.
Patole said that the BJP government at the Centre had imposed a sudden lockdown during the Covid pandemic. “The central government did not help the people in this difficult time but the Congress party and the Maharashtra government helped millions of people who were stranded due to the sudden shutdown in the country. The Congress has always been at the forefront to help people in distress. The Prime Minister has insulted Maharashtra by accusing the state of spreading Covid19 while we were helping lakhs of people as part of our social commitment,” he said.
Patole said that the Maharashtra Congress has been holding agitations in front of the houses of BJP Union Ministers and MPs in the state, to demand the Prime Minister's apology for “insulting” the people of Maharashtra. “In the second phase of this agitation, letters will be sent asking the Prime Minister to apologize to the people of this state on the auspicious occasion of Shiv Jayanti,” he said. It may be recalled that heavy traffic congestion was witnessed in south Mumbai on February 14, as the Congress took out a morcha to the official residence of the house of leader of the Opposition Devendra Fadnavis of the BJP at Malabar Hill. Thousands of Congress workers had turned out for the morcha from different parts of