India’s students do not need PM Modi’s forgiveness, they are owed his apology: Rahul Gandhi

File photo: PM Modi and leader of opposition in Lok Sabha, Rahul Gandhi

NEW DELHI: Reacting sharply to Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s late night Instagram video on Friday, Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi while citing leaked papers, cancelled exams and years of hard work of students destroyed in the process, lashed out at the PM for having the “audacity” to speak of “forgiving” students. “India’s students do not need his forgiveness. They are owed his apology,” Gandhi said.In an Instagram video posted on Friday night PM said that he will forgive young protesters accused of abusing him and his late mother, saying they are misguided children and it is “our job to show them the right way”.“Nothing is more painful than seeing a parent grieve their child. Behind every young life lost is a family carrying pain that will never leave them – and serious questions about a broken education system,” Gandhi said in a post on X where he also shared images of his interaction with parents and students.“Leaked papers. Cancelled exams. Years of preparation destroyed overnight. Our students are told to work honestly in a system that is not honest with them. And the Prime Minister has the audacity to speak of “forgiving” students,” Gandhi added.Alleging that the PM has not met a single grieving parent and has not sat with a single student whose future was stolen by a leaked paper, Gandhi said that the students don’t need Modi’s forgiveness rather “they are owed his apology”. Reacting sharply to the PM”s video, Congress general secretary Jairam Ramesh said in a post on X that the “PM enjoys playing the victim card” and added that Modi’s “InstaGram Sabhas are fooling no one”.“Late last night, in an act of supreme self-obsession, the PM said that he forgave our youth. This is an insult to the nation and to our youth which has suffered under his govt and is legitimately demanding an apology from him,” Ramesh said.The Congress leader went on to accuse the PM of using “vile vitriol against his predecessors and political opponents”. “He very frequently peddles lies to defame them, not just in his public speeches but in Parliament itself. He unleashes an army of foul-mouthed abusers both in Parliament and outside and gives them full protection,” Ramesh alleged.

The Congress leader said that “the entire nation is wanting the PM to apologise for the trauma suffered by the youth due to paper leaks and the brutality unleashed on student protesters. Ramesh also raised the donation theft by Ram Temple Trust in Ayodhya.“The entire nation is waiting for the PM to apologise for the ‘Chanda Chori Astha Dhoka’ by the Ram Mandir Trust, an establishment which he had grandly announced in the Lok Sabha on February 5, 2020,” he added.Ramesh further said that “the entire nation is still expecting his apology for his Tughlakian decision of Nov 8 2016 that destroyed crores of livelihoods and shuttered lakhs if MSMEs. The list is endless.”