The Congress on Tuesday accused Prime Minister Narendra Modi of “whitewashing real history” as he obliquely targeted Jawaharlal Nehru for mismanaging the accession of Jammu and Kashmir to India.

Congress communications chief Jairam Ramesh said: “The Prime Minister has once again whitewashed real history. He overlooks the following facts only to castigate Nehru on J&K. All this has been documented well in Rajmohan Gandhi’s biography of Sardar (Vallabhbhai) Patel. These facts are also known to the Prime Minister’s new man (Ghulam Nabi Azad) in J&K.”

Ramesh explained: “1. Maharaja Hari Singh dithered on accession. There were dreams of independence. But when Pakistan invaded, Hari Singh acceded to India. 2. Sheikh Abdullah championed accession to India entirely because of his friendship with and admiration for Nehru, and his respect for Gandhi. 3. Sardar Patel was okay with J&K joining Pakistan till September 13, 1947, when the Nawab of Junagadh acceded to Pakistan.”

Addressing a public rally on Monday, Modi had said: “Sardar saheb persuaded all the princely states to merge with India. But another person handled this one issue of Kashmir. As I am following in the footsteps of Sardar saheb, I have values of the land of Sardar and that was the reason I resolved the problem of Kashmir and paid true tributes to Sardar Patel.”

Though Modi didn’t name Nehru, the reference to the first Prime Minister was obvious. The RSS-BJP has a consistent view that Nehru messed up Kashmir while Patel’s political skills were demonstrated in the merger of princely states post-Independence. The RSS-BJP had publicly pledged to repeal Article 370, and diluted its key provisions in 2019. Modi was referring to this decision while claiming to have “resolved the Kashmir issue.”