New Delhi: The BJP on Monday said the Congress had committed a crime against the country by declaring that September 7 had nothing to do with national song Vande Mataram.
The Opposition party mounted the attack on Congress chief Sonia Gandhi for not attending a function to commemorate the centenary of the song.
BJP vice-president Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi said the ruling party was trying to cover up Gandhi's action by creating a controversy over the historical relevance of September 7.
"It is committing a crime against the country by trying to cover up Gandhi's action. Dates do not make history. And in this case, history was created last week when the entire country sang the national song in tribute to the motherland," Naqvi said.
He pointed out that the Congress-ruled UPA government had itself come out with the order regarding singing of the national song, which was turned into a recommendation later in the wake of Muslim opposition, on the singing of Vande Mataram on September 7.
The BJP leader, whose party is trying to re-establish itself as an organisation espousing the RSS' core Hindutva ideology ahead of Assembly elections in several states, also accused the Congress of surrendering to fundamentalist forces.
"The absence of Gandhi and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh at the Vande Mataram event on September 7 was a reflection of the Congress' votebank politics," Naqvi said.
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