Congress calls NDA ‘Nitish/Naidu dependent alliance’

The Congress on Friday described the NDA as “Nitish-Naidu Dependent Alliance” and Narendra Modi as a “one-third Prime Minister” as it took a swipe at the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader, saying he did not refer to NDA as many times in the last 10 years as he did in his speech at the National Democratic Alliance meeting on Friday.

Referring to Modi bowing down before a copy of the Constitution and lifting it to his forehead reverentially in the Central Hall of the Old Parliament House before the NDA meeting, Congress general secretary Jairam Ramesh claimed that Modi’s embrace of the Constitution was a “drama” as he has attacked the same Constitution several times in the past 10 years.

“Sahib [apparent reference to Modi] took the name of NDA more times in his one-and-half-hour speech than he did in the last 10 years,” Congress leader Pawan Khera said at a press conference. “You and I understand that the full form of NDA is Nitish/Naidu Dependent Alliance.”

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Though the BJP emerged as the single largest party winning 240 seats in the just-concluded general elections, it fell well short of the simple majority mark of 272 in the 543-member Lok Sabha, making it dependent on allies — N Chandrababu Naidu-led Telugu Desam Party (TDP), Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar-led Janata Dal (United), among others — to form the next government. Overall, the NDA enjoys comfortable majority with 293 seats.

On Friday, the BJP’s allies unanimously endorsed Modi as the NDA parliamentary party leader during the meeting of the alliance, after which he was appointed as PM-designate by President Droupadi Murmu.

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As soon as Modi entered the Central Hall for the meeting, he bowed before a copy of the Constitution placed there and lifted it to his forehead reverentially.

In a video message he posted on X, Ramesh said: “There is no limit to the hypocrisy of the one-third prime minister. Today he has touched the Constitution to his forehead — the same Constitution which he has continuously ignored for [the last] 10 years and for which the RSS-BJP had sought 400 seats to execute their decades-long conspiracy to dismantle it.”

In another post, he claimed: “The BJP parliamentary committee did not meet but the NDA appointed one-third PM in advance. This was done because Modi was not sure whether the elected MPs of the BJP would choose him as their leader or not...”