New Delhi, Feb 10 (UNI) Amidst North-South India row raised by Congress-led opposition parties, former Prime Minister HD Deve Gowda on Saturday said Lord Ram united the nation and laid its foundation.
“… It is through Lord Rama and his divine blessings that united this nation and laid the foundation for our nation,” he said addressing the last day of the ongoing Budget session of Parliament.
The former PM also stated that Lord Rama is a symbol of righteousness and accommodativeness, and it was a great moment of personal joy and devotion for him to attend the consecration of the Lord.
“I and my wife both attended the consecration of the Lord Rama temple in Ayodhya. It was a great moment of personal joy and devotion for me like it was for millions of Indians. Ayodhya Ram exists in our hearts and minds as an image that our ancestors and elders have permanently created,’ the JD(S) supremo said.
“Lord Rama is a symbol of righteousness, he is a symbol of love and graciousness, is a man who followed dharma and Raj Dharma, he was very accommodative,” Deve Gowda said.
It is these values that are enshrined in Lord Rama that drew Mahatma Gandhi to him and it was him who made Lord Rama a symbol of the great virtues of the nation, he said.
Further, Deve Gowda wished and prayed that Lord Rama temple in Ayodhya would become the symbol of the nation and the world.
These comments are made after Prime Minister Narendra Modi tore into the states like Congress-ruled Karnataka, which are questioning the devolution formula and demanding a share of taxes in line with their contribution.
This narrative is an attempt to create a North-South divide, Modi said.
Deve Gowda also congratulated Prime Minister for religiously doing the 11-day fasting rituals in the run-up to the Ram Lalla Pran Pratishtha day. “I was so happy and I must be very frank that Modi was so dedicated and so sincere while performing the Pran Pratistha function,” he said.
Deve Gowda also welcomed the union government’s decision to award Bharat Ratna and appealed to those who questioned the move not to differ with the Centre on this issue.
“Unnecessary, let us not try to again differ on a major issue taken by our prime minister to confer Bharat Ratna for these great leaders,” the Ex-PM said.
The Centre on Thursday announced that Chaudhary Charan Singh, PV Narasimha Rao and MS Swaminathan will be awarded Bharat Ratna posthumously.
The budget session was initially scheduled to conclude on February 9 and has been extended by a day.
