Former Congress President Rahul Gandhi sharply attacks Prime Minister Narendra modi on India – China Boarder Standoff. In an interview Mr Gandhi said “One man’s image is not a substitute for a national vision”.
Here is the full text of interview.
Question: How should India respond to China?
Psychologically you have to deal with the Chinese from a position of strength.
If you deal with them from a position of strength, you can work with them you can get what you need and it can be actually done. But if they sense weakness then you had it.
The first thing is your not gonna take on China without a vision. And by that I don’t mean a national vision. I mean an international vision.
Belt and road, an attempt to change the nature of the planet.
India has to have a global vision. India now has to become an idea. And it has to become a global idea. So that’s the thing that’s gonna protect India, is actually thinking big.
Of course we have this border issue and we have to resolve this border issue. But we have to change our approach we have to change how we think.
This this is the point at which the road parts. If we go this way we become a major player if we go this way, we become irrelevant
That is why I’m aggravated. Because I can see that a huge opportunity is being lost. Why?
Because we are not thinking long term; because we are not thinking big and because we are disturbing our internal balance.
We are fighting amongst each other. Just look at the politics. All day long; all day long; Indian is fighting Indian.
And it is because there is no clear cut vision going forward.
And I know that the Prime Minister is an opponent. My responsibility is to question him. My responsibility is to ask questions and to put pressure on him so he does his work. His responsibility is to give the vision. It’s not there.
I can tell you, guaranteed, it’s not there and that’s why China’s is in there today.