"Prime Minister is crippled, psychologically broken, will struggle to run government": Rahul Gandhi

"The silence (of government) is because the Prime Minister is crippled. Right now, the PM's main agenda is the (election of) Speaker. He is not bothered about NEET or all these things. He is bothered about his government and Speaker. That is where his mind is," Rahul Gandhi said at a press conference on Thursday.

In a scathing attack on Prime Minister Narendra Modi over the alleged irregularities in NEET and cancellation of UGC-NET, Congress MP Rahul Gandhi said that he is silent on the entire issue because he is "crippled" and he has "psychologically collapsed" post-elections and will struggle to run a government like this. Rahul Gandhi further said that it seems PM Modi is more concerned regarding the election of the Speaker and not bothered about NEET.

"The silence (of government) is because the Prime Minister is crippled. Right now, the PM's main agenda is the (election of) Speaker. He is not bothered about NEET or all these things. He is bothered about his government and Speaker. That is where his mind is," Rahul Gandhi said at a press conference on Thursday. "We have a government now, and a Prime Minister now, who will find it very difficult to function. The Prime Minister, if I might say so, is psychologically broken. He has collapsed, psychologically collapsed. and knowing his personality, he will struggle to run a government like this," he added.

Continuing his attack on the Prime Minister, Rahul Gandhi said that PM Modi's idea of running the government by frightening people is not working at present. "Mr Modi's idea of running government is to generate fear in people, to frighten people, to make people not speak. But now people are not scared of him," he said.

Rahul Gandhi further said that people ridicule PM Modi at present and this may lead to "psychological tensions" in the Prime Minister. "...Now nobody in the country is afraid of him (PM Modi). They ridicule him now. Earlier the chest was 56 inches, but now I cannot give the number, but it has become 30-32. The balloon which was so big has now become small. This will lead to psychological tensions in him and lead to many problems," he said.

Rahul Gandhi further said that Narendra Modi's way of working is not similar to former Prime Ministers like Atal Vihai Vajpayee and Manmohan Singh who have led coalition governments in the past. "If there had been a leader like Vajpayee or Manmohan Singh who had humility, respected people, listened to them, he could have worked in such a situation. But this is not Narendra Modi's style. Narendra Modi cannot listen to anyone, cannot work without force," he said.

Rahul Gandhi also hinted that there are internal problems in the Bharatiya Janata Party and the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh as well. "There are internal problems too, there are problems in their party, there are issues in their parent organization," he said.

The Congress MP from Rae Bareli further said that people have now realised that they are "sitting on a disaster" and they are no longer quiet like before. "Before the elections, it was clear that there was massive control of the media, other institutions, so people were quiet. Now people are clear that we are sitting on a disaster and we have got a government that is crippled and cannot do the job. It is literally walking around on one leg," Rahul Gandhi said.

Acknowledging that the 'paper leak' issue is a crisis, Rahul Gandhi said, "Yes, it is a crisis, a profound national crisis, it's an economic crisis, it's an educational crisis, institutional crisis. But I don't see any response. I don't even see the capability of a response." Speaking about the people who have been arrested from Bihar in the "paper leak" case, he said, "Regarding Bihar, we have said that there should be an inquiry and action should be taken against those who have leaked the paper."

When asked if he will raise the NEET issue and the UGC-NET exam cancellation in Parliament, Rahul Gandhi said, "Yes, we will raise the issue in Parliament." Rahul Gandhi also pointed out that the opposition is strong at present and the political situation is "interesting".

"Moreover, there is a very strong opposition, so it is a very interesting time," he said. Highlighting the pressures faced by the students appearing for these competitive examinations, Rahul Gandhi said, "There is a huge pressure on our students and the pressure comes from a number of directions. The first direction is the large-scale unemployment that is there in the country. Everybody understands it, everybody knows it and one of the reasons the government suffered in the elections was that all youngsters believe that PM Modi is incapable of solving the employment problem. There is huge pressure because of this and there is very few avenues for students in all areas."

Attacking the BJP government over the cancellation of exams, Rahul Gandhi said, "You have cut off the job avenue, now you are cutting off the exam avenue. You are saying that you can take an exam, you can study and work as hard as you can, on the last day we are going to tell you that the exam is cancelled...The youth of India has nowhere to go. It does not matter whether you are an IIT graduate or you are trying to join the Army. The youngsters of India simply have no way through. It is not just the education crisis, it is a crisis in pretty much every sphere that we are facing." On the role of the Congress in pressuring the government on these issues, Rahul Gandhi said. "The education system has been captured by one organisation. They put their people on every post. It will have to be reversed. Secondly, in the manifesto, we clearly said that taking action after the paper leak is one thing but we also said that the systems that were there before the paper leak, the rules of the university exams, they will have to be assessed again, studied and redesigned. We have clearly written these two things in our manifesto and the opposition will try to get these two things done by putting pressure on the government."

The NEET-UG 2024 exam was conducted on May 5 and the results were declared on June 4, ahead of its scheduled announcement date of June 14. Protests were held alleging irregularities and paper leaks as the results showed that as many as 67 students had topped the exam with a perfect score of 720. The NEET-UG examination, conducted by the National Testing Agency (NTA), paves the way for admission to MBBS, BDS, AYUSH and other related courses in government and private institutions across the country.

The Ministry of Education on Wednesday cancelled the University Grants Commission-National Eligibility Test (UGC-NET) exam conducted by the National Testing Agency (NTA) on June 18. A fresh examination shall be conducted, for which information shall be shared separately.On June 19, 2024, the University Grants Commission (UGC) received certain inputs from the National Cyber Crime Threat Analytics Unit of the Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre (I4C) under the Ministry of Home Affairs on the Examination. These inputs prima facie indicate that the integrity of the aforesaid examination may have been compromised.(ANI)

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