The Congress on Saturday went on an offensive and asked BJP president JP Nadda to apologise over party leaders circulating a doctored video of Rahul Gandhi and warned the saffron party of legal action if it failed to say sorry.
In a letter to Nadda, Congress general secretary and chief spokesperson Jairam Ramesh said that the BJP party leaders were “deliberately and enthusiastically” sharing a modified report that was aired on Zee News at 9 pm on July 1.
"The original video was Rahul Gandhi’s comment on the SFI [Students Federation of India] violence on his Wayanad office, but it was deliberately and mischievously doctored to appear as if it was a comment on the heinous murder of Kanhaiya Lal in Udaipur,” Ramesh wrote.
On June 24, Rahul Gandhi’s office was vandalised by members of SFI. The members wanted Rahul Gandhi to intervene on behalf of farmers in a Supreme Court verdict about having 1-km boundaries around forest tracts and wildlife sanctuaries. The boundaries could harm the life and livelihood of many inhabitants, especially in the densely-populated Idukki area.
In Udaipur, on June 28, a tailor was killed for supporting suspended BJP spokesperson Nupur Sharma. She had made disparaging remarks about the Prophet Mohammed in May.
Ramesh on Saturday said that BJP leaders like MP Subrat Pathak and MLA Kamlesh Saini had shared the doctored video of Rahul. Ramesh also said that Lok Sabha MP Rajyavardhan Rathore propagated the fake video.
“Despite being cautioned by my party colleagues that the clip was maliciously false and misleading, Rathore persisted with amplifying the same, first deleting and then re-uploading the same,” Ramesh wrote.
“This leaves no doubt that his actions were deliberate and part of your party’s strategy to defame the former Party president to defame the Congress party and to further polarise an already sensitive, communal situation,” Ramesh added.