Narendra Modi, Manmohan Singh greet each other at ceremony to mark 2001 Parliament attack
Over the past week, the two have been criticising each other while campaigning for the Gujarat elections.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his predecessor Manmohan Singh greeted each other warmly on Wednesday, as political leaders across party lines met at Delhi’s Parliament House complex to mark the 16th anniversary of the attack in the premises in 2001, PTI reported.
Later in the day, however, Singh said he was “deeply pained and anguished by the falsehood” Modi was spreading “to score political points in a lost cause”. In a video released by the Congress on Twitter, Singh said the prime minister was “setting a dangerous precedent by his insatiable desire to tarnish every constitutional office” – a statement he had made on Monday, as well.
Over the past week, Modi and Singh criticised each other repeatedly while campaigning for the Gujarat elections. Modi had accused Singh of working with Pakistan to ensure the BJP’s defeat in Gujarat, while Singh had said Modi was spreading falsehoods to “score political points” ahead of the polls.
BJP National President Amit Shah took to Twitter to react to Singh’s comments. “We are seeing a very angry Manmohan Singh ji these days,” he said. “We just want to ask him whether he was so angry when monumental loot and plunder was happening under his watch.”
Among others at the ceremony to pay tribute to the victims of the Parliament attack were Vice President M Venkaiah Naidu, Lok Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan, BJP veteran LK Advani, Congress President Sonia Gandhi and party President-elect Rahul Gandhi.
Political leaders also took to Twitter to pay tributes:
On December 13, 2001, five gunmen drove into Parliament in a car plastered with a fake sticker pass. Once inside the complex, they got out of the vehicle and opened fire. A gunfight ensued as security personnel returned fire, and one of the intruders detonated explosives strapped to his waist.
Fourteen people died in the attack, including police and security personnel, a gardener, a journalist and the militants themselves. The strike was allegedly carried out by the Masood Azhar-led Jaish-e-Mohammed terrorist group.