Panday, Bharath criticise PM’s Republic Day message

Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar’s Re­pub­lic Day mes­sage to Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) sup­port­ers has trig­gered fresh po­lit­i­cal con­tro­ver­sy, with Pa­tri­ot­ic Front leader Mick­ela Pan­day, for­mer UNC min­is­ter Vas­ant Bharath and oth­er promi­nent voic­es ques­tion­ing both the tone and tim­ing of her re­marks.

In a so­cial me­dia mes­sage di­rect­ed at UNC mem­bers on Thurs­day, Per­sad-Bisses­sar re­flect­ed on the par­ty’s po­lit­i­cal jour­ney, say­ing that since 1976, the UNC and its pre­de­ces­sor or­gan­i­sa­tions had at times been “un­der­es­ti­mat­ed, vil­i­fied and dis­re­spect­ed.”

How­ev­er, she ar­gued that some of those chal­lenges stemmed from the “self­ish­ness, cow­ardice and ar­ro­gance of weak men and women with­in our own par­ty.”