Probably, these two adjectives would be sufficient to describe the nature of the statement made by Sonia Gandhi in Parliament. Referring to the NDA in Parliament, Sonia Gandhi said, “People who never had faith in the Constitution, nor participated in its drafting, are now swearing by it. There cannot be a bigger joke than this.” Obviously, it was also a reference to the ‘Sangh Parivar’. While it is quite common nowadays for the opposition to say that the government does not believe in the constitution, the latter part of Sonia Gandhi’s statement is false.
She cannot accuse the BJP or its ideological father, the RSS of not participating in the drafting of the Constitution. They were not allowed to! Nehru tried his best to stomp out the RSS which he believed was becoming a serious threat to the hegemony of the Congress. The RSS head was put behind bars for a period of 18 months, an insult which did not generate any ill-will in them. Had the BJP been a part of the drafting of the constitution, history over the last six decades would have definitely taken a different course.