The ‘shameful’ bigotry of the BJP has not only isolated India but also damaged her global standing, former Congress president Rahul Gandhi said on Monday, while targeting the ruling party over controversial remarks made by its now sacked spokespersons against Prophet Mohammad.
While the party’s official Twitter handle questioned why these BJP functionaries have not been arrested yet, former Finance Minister P. Chidambaram said “Nupur Sharma and Naveen Kumar were not the original creators of Islamophobia as they trying to be more loyal than the king”.
Taking to Twitter, Mr. Gandhi said, “Divided internally, India becomes weak externally. BJP’s shameful bigotry has not only isolated, but also damaged India’s global standing”.
The Congress’ official handle tweeted that the country will not apologise for the mistakes of the BJP, but the ruling party president should do so. “Instead of doing a drama of action against anti-social elements in the party who have defamed India at the international level, it should immediately arrest them,” it said with the #hashtag BJP_Defames_India.
‘Raj dharma’
Echoing such a position, party spokesperson Pawan Khera said, “why should the country pay a price for the mistakes of the BJP. Nothing can be more shameful than the the fact that the Prime Minister is reminded by Qatar and Kuwait about his Raj dharma”.
Mr. Khera said if the Prime Minister had reprimanded BJP supporters and TV anchor who indulged in regular hate campaign against a particular community, then the country would have been saved from the present embarrassment.
Another Congress leader Jairam Ramesh said, “Our dapper External Affairs Minister got his spokesman to dismiss a U.S. government report on religious minorities in India as ‘vote-bank politics in international relations’. U.S. allies in Gulf are giving a reply”.
In a series of tweets, party’s chief spokesperson Randeep Surjewala called the BJP’s claim of respecting all religions a ‘sham’.
“In order to get votes, the top leadership of the party creates a new vocabulary with words like Shamshan-Kabristan (cremation ground versus graveyard), 80:20, Bulldozer ... ”Mr. Surjewala said,.
