Yogendra Yadav: Bharat Jodo Yatra is a moral mission, those who want to unite India are not alone

“You are right. I don’t belong to Congress. In fact, I came to politics as a critic of the Congress party and opposed them,” Yadav told South First. “I will oppose them in the future too, on things that I don’t approve of,” he added with a smile.

‘Those in power consciously dividing country’

“We have extended support to this yatra, and for a very specific reason. Because this is the moment, more than ever before in our history, where our country is being divided consciously by those who rule and wield power. This is exactly what the British did. This is divide and rule in a classic way,” Yadav said.

Yogendra Yadav walking alongside Congress leader Rahul Gandhi at Bharat Jodo Yatra. (Twitter: YogendraYadav)

He insisted that the ruling government led by the BJP has led the country to a state of “unprecedented inequalities”.

“They can’t manage the economy, we have one of the worst employment situations ever and the highest inequalities in the world. In the last two years, 97 percent of Indians’ wealth has gone down but (Gautam) Adani and (Mukesh) Ambani manage to multiply their wealth. In order to hide all this and cover their incompetence they use Hindu-Muslim and Hindu-Christian (issues) all the time. What else were the English doing?” Yadav asked.

‘Only two parties in the country’

At a time Opposition party leaders like Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar and his Telangana counterpart K Chandrashekar Rao are meeting with non-Congress, non-BJP parties, Yadav narrowed down the political space in the country to just two.

“At this moment, there are only two parties in this country. Those who divide this country and those who seem to oppose this move. At a moment like this in history, you have no choice. This is the only choice. We joined the Bharat Jodo Yatra because this is one of those efforts to take on that division,” Yadav told South First, adding that if other parties like DMK or the Left parties come up with a similar initiative, he would support them too.

Yadav added that Congress’ Bharat Jodo Yatra, primarily led by Rahul Gandhi, is witnessing support from citizens.

“There is genuine popular support. People look at it with some hope. It has begun to break that complete spiral of silence and it has begun to give some confidence, but this is just begun, and I wouldn’t read too much into the first five days,” he said with caution.

Moral mission

While acknowledging that the Bharat Jodo Yatra may have electoral consequences, Yadav said he hoped that it wasn’t limited to being election-oriented.

“Yatras are not only election-oriented, and I hope this will not be just election-oriented. It may have electoral consequences, like everything does, but I hope this yatra focuses more on the moral mission of telling Indians that those who want to unite this country are not alone. That they are not solitary voices and that they are not lunatics,” he said.

“We have a history, Constitution and we are a civilisation. If we don’t stand with this in this time of history, our grandchildren will ask us what we were doing,” Yadav said before heading off to resume his walk.