Kharge-Rahul slam Valmiki’s lynching as murder of Constitution, target BJP

NEW DELHI: Exhorting Indians to join the fight against injustice in the wake of mob lynching of a Dalit youth in Rae Bareli, Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge and Rahul Gandhi called Hariom Valmiki’s killing “a crime against the Dalit community and the murder of the Constitution”. In an indirect accusation at the ruling BJP, the Congress brass recounted the various incidents of high-profile Dalit killings and atrocities, and lynching of Muslims, after 2014, to lament that bulldozers and mob rule have replaced the Constitution, and fear has replaced justice in the country.Rahul said, “Today in India, Dalits, Adivasis, Muslims, backward classes, and the poor – every person whose voice is weak, whose share is being snatched away, and whose life is considered cheap – is being targeted. Hatred, violence and mob rule have the patronage of those in power.”Kharge and Rahul said, “After 2014, mob lynching, bulldozer injustice and mob rule have become the scary symbols of our times. Violence cannot be the identity of any civilised society. What happened to Hariom is a serious question mark on our collective morality.”Expressing Congress solidarity with the deprived sections of society, the duo urged the citizens to unite against “this injustice”, and fight a battle till every Indian secures his rights and dignity to life. In the outrage against the lynching of Valmiki, the Congress leaders recalled the incidents that rocked the nation after 2014 – Hathras and Unnao rapes, Hariom’s killing in Rae Bareli, “institutional murder” of Rohith Vemula, urination on a tribal youth by a leader in Madhya Pradesh, brutal torture of Dalits in Odisha and MP, murders of Pehlu Khan in Haryana and Akhlaq in UP – and called the incidents “a reflection of the growing insensitivity of our rulers.”Rahul said, “I stand with Hariom’s family – they will surely get justice. India’s future rests on equality and humanity, and this country will run on the Constitution, not on the whims of the mob.”