Congress divides country into North and South, doing hate politics: Defence Minister Rajnath Singh

Visakhapatnam (Andhra Pradesh) [India], February 27 : Defence Minister Rajnath Singh on Tuesday targeted the Congress, saying that the grand old party which divides the country into North and South is doing politics of hatred and should be stopped.
"Congress divides the country into North and South. It is doing hate politics and should be stopped," he said.
Rajnath Singh said this in his address to the intellectual at the Bharat Rising Elite programme in Visakhapatnam.
Defence Minister Singh also asserted that the BJP does what it promises and added that the party is doing politics to build the nation.
"The Bharatiya Janata Party has ended the crisis of credibility in the politics of this country. We do what we say. We have talked about abolishing Section 370 for a long time. We have done it We had said that we had talked about ending the evil practice of triple talaq. We have done that. We talked about the Uniform Civil Code. Today, the BJP government in Uttarakhand has implemented it," he said.
Dismissing Congress's claim of the BJP being a North Belt and Hindi Belt party, the Defence Minister said the allegation that the BJP is only a party of North Indians is factually completely wrong.
"An allegation is often levelled against us that the BJP is only a part of North India. You all must have heard this... In the last Lok Sabha elections, we got the maximum number of seats in Western India. In Gujarat, we have had a government for almost 30 years. If we talk about the states of southern India, we have had our government in Karnataka for a long time. Presently, we are the second-largest party in West Bengal, Orissa, and Karnataka. Our vote share is continuously increasing in Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, and Kerala. Therefore, the allegation that the BJP is only a party of North Indians is factually completely wrong. For narrow political gains and immediate electoral gains, these people, in the name of discrediting the BJP, also put a question mark on the national integrity of India," he said.
"There are some different structural issues in North India and South India, so our effort should be that we can do something good, something big, by combining both. Our effort should be to connect both more, and not to break both in the name of language and prosperity," he said.
Refuting claims of the BJP being a communal party, the BJP leader said, "Some people accuse the BJP of being a communal party, whereas the BJP is the largest secular party in the world. Today, five Arab countries have given Modiji the highest honour of their country."
Speaking about India's development under PM Modi, he said, "India is not a weak country at all; now India is a powerful country. Today, India's credibility has increased on international platforms. India is no longer a weak country. It has now become a powerful country in the world. Now if anyone glares at India, India will not shy away from giving a reply. Now the heads of state of many countries also believe that the 21st century is going to belong to India," he said.
Highlighting the farsightedness of the BJP, the leader said, "We introduced GST. In the beginning, people faced some problems but today the country has benefited from GST. Our Prime Minister is building next-generation infrastructure today, it is not just to win elections but to strengthen the country in the long term."
Speaking about the recent release of ex-Indian Navy Sailors from Qatar he said, "Our Prime Minister has so much goodwill abroad that eight former Indian sailors who were given death sentences in Qatar got pardoned from there and one of them is from Visakhapatnam. This has been possible only because of the BJP government and Modiji."