Udaipur: Raking up the foreign origin issue, Union Minister and senior BJP (Bharatiya Janata Party) leader Sushma Swaraj today (Apr 1, 2004) alleged that Congress president Sonia Gandhi took Indian citizenship under compulsion and not with pleasure.

"Gandhi accepted Indian citizenship under compulsion and not with pleasure," Swaraj, sharing the dais with Deputy Prime Minister L K Advani, told a public meeting. It took 16 long years for Gandhi to accept Indian citizenship, she said.

"Though she has become an Indian citizen, she has no understanding of culture and civilisation of her adopted country like we. For us India is our motherland but for her it is a country only," Swaraj said.

How can a person become Prime Minister of this country who did not understand it," she said adding even Gandhi failed to play an effective role as an Opposition leader.

The Congress, Swaraj said, was not feeling good because the country was developing and progressing fast under Vajpayee's leadership.

"Congressmen are feeling bad because aspirations of their president to become the Prime Minister are not being fulfilled," she said.