Want 'azaadi' within India and not from India: Kanhaiya targets PM Modi in a rousing speech at JNU

Returning to JNU campus on his release from jail three weeks after his arrest, the university's students' union leader Kanhaiya Kumar tonight said they are seeking freedom within the country and not from India, as he hurled barbs at Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

Addressing students at the campus, 29-year-old Kumar, who has been slapped with sedition charge for allegedly raising anti-national slogans, said he had many differences with the prime minister but he agreed with his tweet "Satyameva Jayate" which he had posted in praise of HRD Minister Smriti Irani's fiery speech in Lok Sabha on the JNU row as it is in the Constitution.

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"I have many differences with the PM but I agree with his tweet Satyameva Jayate because these words are in our Constitution," he said, as his passionate speech was punctuated by repeated cheers and raising of slogans.

"We are not seeking 'azaadi'(freedom) from India. We want 'azaadi' within India," he said.

Thanking all who stood by him while he was in Tihar jail here, Kumar said he believed in the Constitution and Judiciary of India.

Kumar said he had no ill feelings towards anyone and won't indulge in "witch hunting" towards RSS's student outfit ABVP.

"There is no animosity towards ABVP because we are democratic. We see them as our opposition," he said.

"We truly believe in democracy and Constitution. We don't look at the ABVP as an enemy, we look at them like the Opposition," he said.

"Let me just say it is not easy to get admission in JNU neither it is easy to silence those in JNU," he added.

Kumar said his arrest is a planned attack on JNU.

"This attack is to delegitimise the UGC protests, to prevent justice to Rohith Vemula(the dalit scholar in Hyderabad who committed suicide," he said.

Kumar said the struggle of peace loving and progressive sections of the society in the wake of the JNU row and Rohith Vemula suicide will be a long fight.

"Is seeking freedom from thorny issues confronting India a crime?," he asked.

He also took a dig at Modi on his 2014 pre-poll promise to deposit Rs 15 lakh in everyone's bank account from the black money which will be brought back by his government if he comes to power.