Press Trust of India | Updated: July 12, 2013 17:54 IST
Ahmedabad: Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi has defended his actions in the 2002 Gujarat riots and said that an Special Investigation Team (SIT) set up by the Supreme Court had given him a "clean chit".
In a rare interview to the Reuters news agency in his official residence in Gandhinagar, the first since he was appointed the chief of the Bharatiya Janata Party's (BJP) election campaign committee in June, Mr Modi was asked if it was frustrating when many people define him by 2002.
He responded by saying that he would feel guilty if he had done something wrong. "Frustration comes when you think 'I got caught. I was stealing and I got caught.' That's not my case."
Asked if he regretted what had happened, the Gujarat strong man was quoted by Reuters as saying that the Supreme Court had created a Special Investigating Team which in its
report had given him a "thoroughly clean chit, a thoroughly clean chit".
"Another thing, any person if we are driving a car, we are a driver, and someone else is driving a car and we're sitting behind, even then if a puppy comes under the wheel, will be painful or not? Of course, it is. If I'm a chief minister or not, I'm a human being. If something bad happens anywhere, it is natural to be sad." (Read: Modi's puppy analogy sparks political storm)
Mr Modi was asked if he had done the right thing in 2002. "Absolutely. However much brainpower the Supreme Being has given us, however much experience I've got, and whatever I had available in that situation and this is what the SIT had investigated," he replied.
Answering a question about being regarded as a polarising figure, Mr Modi cited the example of Democrats and Republicans in the US to emphasise that polarisation was "democracy's basic nature".
Narendra Modi's 'puppy' analogy sparks political storm
Edited by Deepshikha Ghosh | Updated: July 12, 2013 19:03 IST
New Delhi: Gujarat Chief minister Narendra Modi's use of a puppy analogy while referring to the deaths in his state in the 2002 riots have triggered a political storm, but the BJP says he is being misinterpreted.
In an interview to the Reuters news agency, Mr Modi said: "Even If I am in the back seat of a car and a puppy comes under the wheels, isn't it painful? It is. Whether I am a chief minister or not, I am a human being - I will be sad if something bad happens anywhere."
Samajwadi Party leader Kamal Farooqui slammed Mr Modi, saying, "It is a very sad, humiliating and disturbing statement. He is saying Muslims are worse than even puppies? He should immediately apologise to the people of this nation."
"Speaking of anything that is hurtful, be it for a human being or an animal, there should be a sense of remorse. I don't think he felt the sadness that he spoke about," Union minister Salman Khurshid of the Congress told NDTV.
The BJP has said it is "despicable" to say Mr Modi compared a community to dogs. Party spokesperson Nirmala Sitharaman said, "People should read the interview. This is a complete misinterpretation leading to an unwanted controversy where one doesn't exist," said BJP spokesperson Nirmala Sitharaman.
She explained that Mr Modi was in fact saying that "any human being would be saddened even if a puppy comes under a car. An expression used in relation to show that any human being would feel bad."
Mr Khurshid has suggested that Mr Modi should "speak less if he doesn't want to be misinterpreted."
The Janata Dal-United, which recently snapped ties with the BJP, said Mr Modi seemed to have lost his mental balance. "The statement shows that Mr Modi is incapable of taking every community along."
© Copyright NDTV Convergence Limited 2013
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