Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday asserted BJP has made more sacrifices than any other party and faced more adversities in Independent India as compared to what the Congress would have during the British rule.
On the occasion of foundation stone laying ceremony of the new party headquarters in New Delhi, the Prime Minister regretted that every effort of his party was seen in “bad light”.
Highlighting his party's commitment to the motto of 'sabka saath, sabka vikaas', he asked party workers to present to the country and the democratic world an example of how a party “devoted to ideals and devoid of dynasty” functions as the world knows the saffron outfit “not the way it is but based on hearsay”.
“The BJP will be the only party which has faced adversities since its birth. It faced
difficulties at every turn and
its every effort was seen in
bad light.
“Even during the British times, the Congress would not have faced so much adversity that we, our dedicated workers have gone through in 50-60 years,” he said at the event attended by top BJP leaders, including party president Amit Shah, lK Advani, Rajnath Singh and Arun Jaitley among others.
Modi used the occasion to congratulate grappler Sakshi Malik for bringing glory to the country by winning a bronze medal in the Rio Olympics.
In an oblique attack on the ruling Trinamool Congress, the Prime Minister said during the recent West Bengal assembly polls, it was difficult for the BJP candidates to even hire an office in Kolkata as anybody willing to give them space would face trouble.
“No party has perhaps made more sacrifices than us (BJP) after freedom,” he said, adding that “hundreds of” its workers were killed because they were not associated with the prevalent ideology of those times.
BJP workers do not work for crowd but for organisation as “anybody can collect a crowd by talking about populist issues but what is more important is to stick to ideology”, he said.
Evoking laughter, he said, in a lighter vein, election candidates of no other party would have forfeited more deposits than those of BJP as they kept fighting for their ideology irrespective of the results.
“The world was surprised again over how much we had grown when the Government of Vajpayee ji was formed. They tried to know about us from others, so they could never understand us correctly. The world's curiosity has arisen again now.”
Stressing on party leaders' commitment to ideology, Modi said rival parties would certainly have thought that they will be served well if likes of lK Advani, Atal Bihari Vajpayee or Murli Manohar Joshi joined them, but these leaders decided to live for ideals.