Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Tuesday claimed that he was "not allowed" to interact with students of a private university in Meghalaya as part of Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra at the "instructions" of the Union Home minister.
The directive to the varsity authorities was conveyed by the Union minister through the Assam chief minister's office, he claimed.
"I wanted to come to your university and address you, listen to you, understand what you are facing. But what happened is that the Home minister of India called up the Chief Minister of Assam and the CMO called up the leadership of the university and said that Rahul Gandhi must not be allowed to speak to the students," Gandhi said, addressing students and others from atop his Yatra bus in the Assam-Meghalaya border.
Gandhi was scheduled to hold separate interactions with students, civil society members and party leaders at the University of Science and Technology, Meghalaya, (USTM) in Meghalaya's Ri Bhoi district, bordering Assam, on Tuesday morning.
The programmes at the private varsity were announced by the Congress on Monday afternoon but were re-scheduled to a hotel, also in Ri Bhoi district, later after the university withdrew the permission.
Gandhi is leading a Manipur-to-Mumbai Nyay Yatra of the party, which entered Assam from Meghalaya on Tuesday for the second and final leg of its travel through the state. It will travel through Assam till January 25.
"It is not important if Rahul Gandhi comes or not. What is important is that you are allowed to listen to anybody you want," he said.
"Rahul Gandhi coming here is the least important thing happening here. It is about you having an imagination, being allowed to do what you want," he said, appreciating the students and youth who lined the road to listen to him.
"You have come here because you do not agree with what the chief minister is trying to do. You are not ready to accept an enslaved Assam and I am extremely proud of that," he added.
"They want to turn you into slaves but I know that nobody, no power in the universe can do it," Gandhi asserted, while attacking the BJP.
He also maintained that "this is happening not only in Assam but in every school, college, university of India", where the students are "being not allowed to have their own imagination".
"You are the future of the country and the most important thing for the country is that all of you are allowed to think freely, to believe freely, to imagine freely, to live the life you want and not somebody else wants," the MP added.
He maintained that there are attempts to make the youth "blindly obedient".
Gandhi asserted that the youth must be able to follow their own imagination and "nobody should be allowed to prevent you from imagining and thinking about the India that you want".
"Nobody should be able to stop you from reading and writing any language you want, nobody should be able to stop you from listening, reading your tradition, culture or history", the Congress leader added.
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