Patna, Apr 10 (PTI) Congress leader Kanhaiya Kumar on Thursday asserted that the extradition of Tahawwur Rana – key accused in the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks – from the US is a ploy by the BJP to “divert” attention of the public from the “failure” of the central government to fulfill its promises.

Kumar also rejected the claim by Union Home Minister Amit Shah that the extradition of Rana was a major “diplomatic success” for the Narendra Modi-led government.

Rana, 64, is a close associate of David Coleman Headley, also known as Daood Gilani and one of the main conspirators in the 2008 attacks.

“Since the BJP has no achievement worth the name, it tries to divert public issues under one pretext or the other. The Waqf Bill was just another such example. The government claimed it was bringing the legislation for the benefit of poor Muslims. Who will believe this, coming from a dispensation that does not let members of the community to offer’ namaz’ on their own rooftops?” he said.

“We all remember their rhetoric after abrogation of Article 370. Every BJP leader was saying that now people of Bihar and other parts of the country will be able to purchase land in Kashmir. Show me one person who has been able to buy property there since then,” the former JNU students’ union president said.

Kumar had first shot into limelight in 2016 when he was slapped with a sedition case for participating in a demonstration inside the JNU campus, where slogans in support of a Kashmiri separatist movement were allegedly raised.

The 38-year-old former Left leader has been touring Bihar as part of a state-wide ‘palayan roko, naukri do padayatra’ aimed at mobilising public opinion on joblessness and migration.

Kumar, who had contested the 2019 Lok Sabha polls from his native Begusarai on a CPI ticket, bristled when asked about the charge of the BJP-led NDA that migration “began” when the state was ruled by the Congress decades ago.

“If we insist on going back in time, then we must acknowledge that people started migrating during the British Raj. They went to far off Mauritius as indentured labourers. Their descendants are today ruling that country,” he said.

“The big difference is, earlier people were migrating in search of greener pastures. Now, they are doing so because they have no other option. As per the data that came out during the COVID pandemic, 70 lakh migrants had returned to Bihar after lockdown. Nobody knows what happened to them,” said the young Congress leader.

The ‘padayatra’ received a major boost earlier this week when Kumar was joined, in Begusarai, by the party’s former president Rahul Gandhi.

“Tomorrow, AICC general secretary Sachin Pilot will be joining us here, in Patna,” Kumar said.

“I have also sought an appointment with Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar before whom I wish to present a memorandum summarising the impressions we have gathered during our tour of the state. Though, going by the current state of affairs, I doubt he will agree to meet,” he said.

The Congress leader, however, appeared mortified when his attention was drawn to Union minister Chirag Paswan accusing him of “divisive politics” with attempts to “disintegrate India”.

“Unlike Chirag, I was not born to a top-ranking politician. If he believes I am so subversive, he should ask his government to put me in jail. He is a young leader whom I wish well and would really appreciate if he raises, in his own capacity, the issues I am trying to highlight,” he said.

Asked whether RJD leader Tejashwi Yadav was invited to the ‘padayatra’ at any stage, Kumar said: “I may invite people if there were a wedding in my family. But this ‘padayatra’ is not a feast. People are joining us of their own accord. Rahul Gandhi, too, had come on his own. Every person of Bihar is welcome to join us.” PTI NAC RBT