Don’t Give Ideological Cover to Anti-National Outlook: Ex-Judges, Military Vets Slam Open Letter Against PM

Around 200 retired judges, former bureaucrats and military veterans have come together to question the motives of ex-civil servants who had written an open letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi over alleged politics of hate in the country.

Addressing an open letter of their own to PM Modi, the 197 signatories said: “We, as Concerned Citizens, do not believe that one more open letter to the Prime Minister by a self-styled Constitutional Conduct Group (CCG) calling for end to the politics of hate has sincere motivations.”

“It is a repeated effort to draw attention to themselves as citizens with a higher sense of social purpose, whereas the reality is that this is a manifest political anti-Modi Government exercise…” the letter said.

The signatories termed the open letter by the former civil servants as “empty virtue signaling”. “They are actually fuelling the politics of hate that they seek to combat by attempting to engineer hate against the present government with their patent prejudices and false portrayals.”

It also questioned the signatories to the first open letter on their silence over post-poll violence in West Bengal and the communal tensions during recent Ram Navami and Hanuman Jayanti processions in parts of India.

“The reality is that instances of major communal violence have palpably decreased under the BJP government and this is appreciated by the public? The CCG should not give ideological cover to an anti-national outlook as well as religious and left-wing extremism, which they seem to do,” the latest open letter said.

It also blamed the recent hijab and halal controversies on “vested interests within the country wanting to keep the narrative alive of minority persecution, majoritarianism and Hindu nationalism under the present government.”

A group of beneficiaries of central government schemes, too, had on Friday criticized former bureaucrats for questioning the PM’s silence on the alleged politics of hate, saying their “inaction” had denied them basic facililites that they have now got under the BJP government.

“This is beyond imagination that you are writing a letter criticising Prime Minister Narendra Modi for silence to an invisible threat to society. You never thought of us when we were compelled to live in poverty due to your bad and anti-poor policies. You then wrote a letter in your support,” the beneficiaries said in an open letter.

Former civil servants, 108 in number, had written to Modi urging him to call for an end to what they termed as “politics of hate” allegedly practised “assiduously” by governments under BJP’s control.

“Your silence, in the face of this enormous societal threat, is deafening,” the letter had said.

The BJP had reacted strongly to their letter, accusing the former officials of trying to spread misinformation and create an atmosphere of distrust in the country.

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