New Delhi: Union Law Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad on Tuesday referred to the images of Hindu gods and spiritual leaders in the original Constitution to launch a veiled attack on the opposition for targeting the BJP-led government over secularism.
Addressing the gathering at an event on the lectures of Jan Sangh ideologue Deendayal Upadhyaya, he said the original Constitution had images of Lord Ram, Krishna, Nataraja, spiritual guru Vivekananda, Sikh Guru Gobind Singh and Mahatma Gandhi among others.
Prasad lauded the country's founding fathers for "injecting soul" into the Constitution by incorporating the images in it, but wondered whether the country had drifted away from its "original thinking" in the last 60-odd years.
He said the Narendra Modi government was working on the "re-awakening" of the country's soul by trying to transform India into a globally respected power.
"If the Constitution was to be written today and the Constituent Assembly decided to have these portraits in the Constitution, will it be allowed? It is a question to be asked," said Prasad.
"The first question (raised by the opposition) will be, are we becoming communal? Is India becoming a Hindu state?" he said.
Prasad said as a "student" of the Constitution, he found the foresight of the country's founding fathers such as the first President, Rajendra Prasad, former prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru, Dalit icon BR Ambedkar, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, Maulana Azad and others "extra-ordinary".
Heaping praise on Upadhyaya, he said the government was working to take the country forward with a focus on the poor and added that India was now being respected across the world. The event was also attended by Union ministers Rajiv Pratap Rudy and Arjun Ram Meghwal.
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