'Maligning India on foreign soil', BJP blasts Rahul Gandhi over remarks on ECI in US

New Delhi, April 21 (IANS) The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Monday tore into the Leader of Opposition (LoP) and Congress MP Rahul Gandhi for his ‘slanderous’ remarks at the Election Commission of India (ECI) and accused him of maligning the country on foreign soil.

Rahul Gandhi’s targeted remarks at the country’s election body while being in the US, invited not just rebuttal but condemnation from several BJP spokespersons, who also called him an ‘agent of George Soros’.

Sambit Patra, in a press conference, said the LoP was again trying to defame the EC and malign the image of the country.

“A person, who and his mother are out on bail on a bond of Rs 50,000 in the National Herald case, are selling propaganda from the foreign soil. Nobody will believe them,” Patra said.

Gandhi, while addressing the Indian diaspora in Boston, US, alleged that the EC was compromised and cited examples of Maharashtra elections to buttress his claims.

"In the Maharashtra Assembly elections, more people voted than the total number of people in Maharashtra, and this is a fact. The EC gave us a figure in the evening around 5.30 p.m., and in two hours, around 7.30 p.m., 65 lakh voters had voted, which is physically impossible," Rahul told the audience.

“There was something fundamentally wrong with the system,” he claimed.

Refuting the charges, Patra asked where the Congress party and Rahul Gandhi were when they joined hands with JMM in Jharkhand for political convenience. “Priyanka’s election from Wayanad took place at the same time,” he added.

“Rahul must remember that he committed robbery in the National Herald case. You are venting your anger against ED at the Election Commission,” Patra remarked, referring to the charge sheet against the Gandhi duo in the AJL case.

“They raise questions on the country’s institutions while being on foreign shores. If you don’t refrain from such habits, you will be called a traitor,” he said.

Pradeep Bhandari also took to X to slam the Congress leader and blasted him for his ‘anti-national’ stand.

“Rahul Gandhi is an anti-democratic & anti-India man who wants to fight the Indian state. Wherever he goes to foreign soil, he abuses the Indian democracy & Indian electoral process,” Bhandari wrote in a post on X.

“Rahul Gandhi who could not win the trust of Indian electorate begins to question Indian democratic process on a foreign soil. Why does Rahul always defame India on a foreign soil? An agent of George Soros who is fighting Indian state - that's what Rahul Gandhi’s intent today is!” he further wrote.

--IANS

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