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The Prime Minister’s speech at CNN-News18’s Rising Bharat Summit 2025, delivered before potential protests by Muslim groups and opposition parties regarding the Waqf Amendment Act, seemed to directly address the Muslim community and outline the government’s stance in the face of legal challenges to the…Read More
Prime Minister Narendra Modi at the Rising Bharat Summit 2025. (Photo: News18)
At CNN-News18’s Rising Bharat Summit, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday addressed the idea of India’s partition, stating that it did not originate from ordinary Muslim families but from “some fundamentalists, who were nourished by some Congress leaders, so that they could become the sole claimants of power”. This also marked the first time that PM Modi extensively discussed the Waqf issue since the Amendment Act’s parliamentary passage and presidential notification.
“The politics of appeasement has been a big challenge in India’s growth. Recently, the law related to Waqf was amended in Parliament. Your network has also discussed this a lot. This debate related to Waqf has the politics of appeasement at its core,” the Prime Minister stated at the event.
PM Modi’s speech, delivered before potential protests by Muslim groups and opposition parties regarding the Waqf Amendment Act, seemed to directly address the Muslim community and outline the government’s stance in the face of legal challenges to the new law. He asserted that appeasement and fundamentalist thinking supported by Congress led to partition, negatively impacting many poor and backward Muslims, including women.
Drawing a parallel to India’s partition, the PM said, “This politics of appeasement is not new. Its seed was sown during our freedom struggle itself. Just think, before India, along with India, and after us, many countries in the world became independent. But how many countries are there whose condition for independence was partition? How many countries have broken up with independence? Why did this happen only with India? Because at that time the desire for power was placed above the interest of the nation”.
He emphasised that the concept of a separate nation was not supported by ordinary Muslim families. “Rather, it was of some fundamentalists, who were nourished by some Congress leaders so that they could become the sole claimants of power,” Modi said.
The PM argued that Congress and certain fundamentalist leaders gained power and wealth through appeasement politics but questioned the benefits for ordinary Muslims. “What did the common Muslim get? What did the poor Pasmanda Muslim get? They got neglect. They got illiteracy. They got unemployment. And what did Muslim women get? They got injustice like Shah Bano, where their constitutional rights were sacrificed to fundamentalism. They got orders to remain silent, pressure not to ask questions. And fundamentalists got an open licence to crush the rights of women,” the Prime Minister said.
Modi criticised appeasement as contrary to India’s social justice principles, accusing the Congress of using it for vote bank politics. “The amendment made in the Waqf Act in 2013 was an attempt to please Muslim fundamentalists and land mafias. This law was given such a shape that it created an illusion of standing above the Constitution. The Constitution, which opened the paths of justice, those very paths were narrowed down by the Waqf Act. And what were its ill effects? The spirits of fundamentalists and land mafias were boosted,” the PM said at the summit.
He cited Waqf claims on land belonging to Christian villagers in Kerala, disputed gurdwara land in Haryana, claims on farmers’ land in Karnataka, and villages in various states, highlighting that thousands of hectares are entangled in NOC and legal complexities. “Be it temples, churches, gurdwaras, farms, government lands, no one was sure that their land would remain theirs. Just one notice would come, and people would keep searching for papers for their own houses and farms. The law, which was for justice, became a cause of fear. What kind of law was this?” the PM said, criticising the Waqf Act, 2013.
Modi commended Parliament for enacting a “wonderful law” in the interest of society and the Muslim community. “Now the sacred spirit of Waqf will be protected, and the rights of the poor, Pasmanda Muslims, women, and children will also be protected,” he said.
The PM highlighted the Waqf Bill debate as the second longest in India’s 75-year parliamentary history. “Both the houses discussed this bill for 16 hours. 38 meetings of JPC were held, discussions were held for 128 hours. About one crore online suggestions came from all over the country. This shows that today, democracy in India is not limited to the four walls of Parliament. Our democracy is becoming stronger with public participation,” the PM said.
