Digvijay Singh slams Narendra Modi's iron collection drive for Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel's statue

Congress general secretary Digvijay Singh today attacked Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi for launching a drive to collect iron from villages across the country for constructing a grand statue of Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, known as the 'Iron Man of India'.

"BJP had earlier launched a drive to collect bricks and sought donations for the construction of Ram temple at Ayodhya, but later sold them. Now they will collect iron pieces from across the country and sell it too," Singh told reporters.

He said that Sardar Patel had banned the RSS after the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi, "even as the BJP has launched a drive to collect iron in his name".

The senior Congress leader criticised the saffron party saying, "though faces and slogans have changed in BJP, the party's way of duping people and collecting money from them in the name of religion has not changed." The Congress leader also raised question over the sequence of happenings in BJP, including Modi's appointment as campaign committee chief and veteran BJP leader L K Advani's resignation.

"I am not able to understand how the same persons suddenly became social workers in the eyes of Advani, whom he had earlier accus ed of indulging in fulfilling their own vested interests," Singh said.

He also blamed the BJP for creating hurdles in the passage of important bills of public interest in Parliament.