Lata Mangeshkar's brother sacked, Kishore Kumar banned for reciting Savarkar's song: PM targets Cong in RS

New Delhi, Feb 8: Prime Minister Narendra Modi targeted Congress in his speech on the motion of thanks to the President's address in Rajya Sabha. He mentioned a few instances where Congress had curbed the freedom of expression in the country.

"Everyone should know how Congress behaved with Lata Mangeshkar's family, who belonged to Goa. Her younger brother Hridaynath Mangeshkar was sacked from his job at All India Radio. His fault was that he had presented a poem on patriotism by Veer Savarkar," PM Modi questioned Congress whether it was 'Freedom of Speech'.

"Majrooh Sultanpuri and Prof Dharampal were both jailed for criticising Nehru. Kishore Kumar did not bow to Indira Gandhi during the Emergency and he was banned from singing on the radio. We know how freedom of expression is curbed when people don't agree to one family," said PM Modi.

He then attacked the grand old party that the party's thinking has been hijacked by 'urban naxals.'

"We are accused of trying to change or rewrite history. This is because of the fact that Congress now thinks like urban Naxals and their psychology has become destructive. The urban Naxals have taken over Congress' consciousness. We are not changing history, we are just refreshing people's memories. We are just taking the history a few 100 years back as it should be. Some people's version of history is just one family, what do we do about that?" he said.

However, the members of Congress walked out of the house, saying that the PM was not talking about the President's Address rather accusing the party.