NEW DELHI: BJP on Tuesday lit into Congress MP Rahul Gandhi for resuming his attack on Veer Savarkar after keeping mum on the Hindutva ideologue during the poll campaign in Maharashtra where he is revered as a social reformer and nationalist.
The party cited PM Narendra Modi‘s remarks during the Maharashtra campaign that Rahul” silence was tactical and that he would go back to deriding Savarkar as soon as the elections were over.
“How can one be so predictable?” asked HRD minister Dharmendra Pradhan as he emphasised that PM Modi had been validated. “PM was absolutely right. By attacking a nationalist, Rahul has confirmed that he is a hard-baked pseudo-secular and an appeaser. Have no hope from Uddhav ji, but am sure that members of his party are watching,” he added.
In his meetings during the Maharashtra campaign, Modi had attacked Shiv Sena (UBT) which counts Savarkar as among its heroes, and Congress for their “opportunistic” tie-up. He challenged Uddhav Thackeray to get Rahul to say “two sentences” in praise of Balasaheb Thackeray, a Hindutva hardliner and a source of inspiration for Shiv Sena, while predicting that the Congress leader would start mocking Savarkar as soon as the Maharashtra campaign was over.
Rahul fired his latest salvo at Savarkar while addressing a Constitution Day event Congress had organised at Talkatora Stadium.
Holding up a copy of the Constitution, Rahul asked whether it reflected Savarkar’s views or his advocacy for violence – remarks which BJP leaders described as “derogatory” towards the freedom fighter.
BJP’s chief spokesperson Anil Baluni accused Rahul of diminishing the contributions of all but his own forefathers to India’s freedom struggle. He labelled Rahul’s approach as that of a “seasonal politician” whose ideology shifted with electoral tides.
Radhakrishna Vikhe Patil, revenue minister in Maharashtra’s outgoing govt, also condemned Rahul’s statement, asking how Congress’s new political allies would react to these perceived insults to Savarkar’s legacy.
BJP’s IT department head Amit Malviya said in a post on X, “Rahul Gandhi is vile and predictable. He didn’t mention Veer Savarkar even once throughout the Maharashtra election and started spewing venom soon after the rout. PM Modi had predicted this. Credit to the people of Maharashtra for showing the abusive dynast his place.”