The spat between the Congress and the ruling BJP is getting personal day by day. On Monday, as the two locked horns yet again, the families of the leaders of both parties got dragged in. The JD(U), which is fighting the Bihar polls in alliance with the Congress, too jumped in.
This, after Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s veiled attack in the United States on the UPA regime’s corruption
and Robert Vadra, Congress president Sonia Gandhi’s son-in-law. Modi had said there were allegations of politicians and their families making crores of rupees while his Government has no graft charge.
The Congress and JD(U) took a dig at Modi, saying, ‘Questions can also be raised as to why he does not stay with his mother.’
The BJP retaliated by drawing a contrast between Modi’s ‘devotion’ to his mother and Sonia Gandhi ‘ruining’ Congress with her ‘devotion to her inept son’.
Referring to Modi getting emotional and breaking down while talking about his mother, Congress spokesman Anand Sharma said, “True to his characteristic style, the PM once again engaged in theatrics, emotion and drama, making boastful claims.” The Congress charged that Modi did not honour her mother by bringing her to his swearing-in ceremony as PM in New Delhi last year.
“The Prime Minister has dragged the political narrative to the gutter level... His mindset is I, me myself...Is a matter of national concern...His unhealthy mindset...It is disturbing and he needs very serious counselling,” Sharma said, attacking the several claims made by Modi during his Silicon Valley visit.
JD(U) leader KC Tyagi too said the Prime Minister should never attack his
country’s Opposition in the foreign land.
On the issue of corruption, Sharma accused the Prime Minister of being hypocritical and practising double standards by making allegations against opponents while the PM is not acting against his own Ministers and Chief Ministers in lalitgate and mining scam as also Vyapam issue. ‘
The BJP, on the other hand, said it was perhaps both significant and revealing that the Congress chose to get personal in an extremely appalling and pathetic manner by commenting on the moving moment when the Prime Minister recalled what his mother had done.
“He is devoted to his mother. He touched her feet after election victory.
This is quite in contrast to the Congress where a mother has ruined the party and is trying to ruin the nation by her utter devotion to her completely inept son. It is this doting behaviour that has made Rahul Gandhi the spoilt child of the Indian politics,” BJP spokesperson MJ Akbar said.
The BJP also continued to target the Congress vice-president over his trip to the US even as Rahul tweeted photograph of himself at a conference in Aspen. Taking a dig, BJP spokesperson Sambit Patra said his party had forced the Congress to ‘turn’ a vacation of Rahul into a photo-op of him attending a conference.