Congress leader Kamal Nath is no different from his colleagues and bosses regarding hypocrisy and double-speak. As soon as elections approach, they conveniently turn into ‘Hindus’ undertaking temple runs. They are aptly known as Chunavi Hindus. In this article, we shall examine the speeches and actions of Kamal Nath, the potential Chief ministerial candidate of Congress, that expose his double-speak.

1) During the last assembly elections, a clip of Kamal Nath during a closed-door meeting in Indore surfaced in which he was heard resorting to the Muslim card. While the MP (Madhya Pradesh) Congress Chief sought the vote of 80-90% of Muslims, he also threatened Hindus and RSS (Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh). Interestingly, the party’s manifesto promised the setting up of Gaushalas, the promotion of Sanskrit, and the construction of the Ram Path & a Narmada parikrama route.

2) It is hard to forget his ‘Hindu majority’ trope, even as Islamist No-Go zones in ‘Hindu majority’ Bharat and some other harsh realities raise a question mark on the ‘Hindu Rashtra’ claim. Interestingly, this seems to be a strategy to lure Hindus in poll-bound Madhya Pradesh, and Congress appears to be repeating the soft-Hindutva approach it had used previously.

3) Besides the Islamist threat, Hindu Samaj also faces threats to its culture across the spectrum from evangelists who have received a free hand under Congress rule. The vanvasi (‘tribal’) community in Kamal Nath’s constituency of Chhindwara district registered a complaint against Christian missionaries last year. They highlighted that missionaries were converting people in the name of “medical treatment.”

Furthermore, the complaint said that these people also promise a hefty sum if the person converts to Christianity. There have been forced conversions and threats of killing if the person denies it. This brings to the fore the discrepancy in the actions and words of ‘Hindu’ Kamal Nath.

4) The video below reiterates that Congress leaders are merely Chunavi Hindus (electoral Hindus). For all his claims of being a ‘Hanuman bhakt’, Kamal Nath showed his true colours by doing what no Hindu would do. A true Hindu would respect Hindu sadhus at all times and not merely during the poll season.

5) According to Kamal Nath, Bharat is not a great country but an ‘infamous‘ (one with ill repute) one. Nothing better can be expected from a leader who doubts the Bharatiya army’s surgical strike operation and demands proof for the same.

6) On the one hand, Kamal Nath claims to be a ‘Hanuman bhakt’, while on the other, he cut a four-tier temple-shaped cake with the image of Bhagwan Hanuman and a saffron on his birthday. As the image went viral on social media, it drew sharp reactions from netizens and political leaders.

Reacting to the controversy, MP CM Shivraj Singh Chouhan slammed the Congress party over their hypocrisy. He said that the Congress party, which opposed the construction of Ram Mandir, now remembers Hanuman Ji for votes. “These people have nothing to do with God’s Bhakti, this (Congress) is the same party that opposed the construction of Ram Mandir. Now when they saw that due to this, they lost votes, they started remembering Hanuman Ji. Who draws Hanuman Ji on a cake and then cuts it? Isn’t this an insult to the Sanatan traditions? This is an insult to Hindu Dharma, and it is unacceptable,” CM Chouhan said. 

7) The hypocrisy of not only Kamal Nath but also Congress came to the fore during the Ram Mandir bhoomipujan. The party that had claimed that Prabhu Sri Ram doesn’t exist rushed to claim ‘credit’ for the construction of Ram Mandir at Ayodhya following the Supreme Court verdict in favour of Ram Lalla. Kamal Nath ‘welcomed’ the construction of Ram Mandir and also conducted a Hanuman Chalisa ‘recital’ at his Bhopal on the eve (4 August 2020) of bhoomipujan.

8) After coming to power in 2020, the Congress government in Madhya Pradesh cancelled the state-sponsored pilgrimage for at least 4000 senior citizens of the state. The Kamal Nath-led Madhya Pradesh cancelled the pilgrimage, which is arranged under the ‘Mukhya Mantri Teerth Darshan Yojna’ (chief minister pilgrimage scheme), citing a cost-cutting exercise.

The cancellation was done just three days before the trip to Vaishno Devi, Kashi, Dwarka and Rameshwaram. The scheme ‘Mukhyamantri Teerth Darshan Yojna’ was introduced in the year 2012 by the then Shivraj Singh Chouhan-led BJP government for non-income tax payee male residents aged 60 and above and women aged 62 years and above.

9) Kamal Nath earned the ire of the Jain community after his government demolished the under-construction Kirti Stambh at Jabalpur despite the community having obtained all the necessary permission for its erection. Kirti Stambh was being built to mark the 50th anniversary of Acharya Vidyasagar Maharaj’s Diksha (initiation to a hermit’s life).

10)The role of Congress leaders, including Kamal Nath, in concocting the ‘Hindu terror’ myth can never be forgotten. Highlighting the involvement of the Congress leader Kamal Nath in developing the ‘Hindu-Terror’ narrative, former under-secretary in the Minister of Home Affairs RVS Mani revealed that Kamal Nath asked him to change the narrative of the Ishrat Jahan encounter case to implicate Narendra Modi.

When Mani refused to comply with the Congress leader’s request to falsify any evidence, Kamal Nath offensively replied, “Bahar log Rahul Gandhi ka peshaab peeney ke liye thayar hai, aap itna chota kaam nahi kar sakte ho? (People are ready to drink Rahul Gandhi’s urine, and can’t you do this small favour?).”

The hypocrisy of Congress leaders percolates from their top leadership, and hence, Kamal Nath’s double-speak is not surprising.