The BJP on Friday approached the Election Commission with a request to issue a show-cause notice to Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi whom it accused for inciting riotous behaviour and throwing to the wind all norms of decency.
In a complaint filed with the EC, the BJP accused the Congress leader of criticising it on the basis of unverified allegations. “The happenings in Muzaffarnagar are still being investigated. He is accusing the BJP, without any iota of proof. He is not naming any other party. He says BJP set Gujarat on fire; the last one decade or more has witnessed a riot free Gujarat. Still he weaves out fancied charges against BJP. BJP is nowhere in Kashmir and yet he blames them,” reads the BJP’s complaint to the EC.
BJP’s demand is based on Rahul’s speeches in election rallies at Churu and Kherli (Alwar) in Rajasthan on October 23 where he referred to the Muzaffarnagar riots and said, “I was seeing my face in their (victims from the minority community) grief. That is why I am against the politics of BJP. They will set Muizaffarnagar on fire, Gujarat on fire, UP on fire and Kashmir on fire and then you and we will have to douse that. BJP divides people.”
The BJP pointed out in its complaint that while attacking the opposition party, Rahul was “significantly muted and silent” on the 1984 riots and erases the role of the Congress party in those riots from history.
The BJP also took exception to Rahul naming communities — the oppressor and the oppressed — and blaming the opposition party. “If this is not an appeal to caste of communal feeling for securing votes (prohibited in Para 1(3) of the MCC), what is itIJ” BJP asked.
Citing the Model Code which says that no party or candidate shall indulge in any activity which may aggravate existing differences or create mutual hatred or cause tension between different castes and communities, religious or linguistic, the BJP said portions of the impassioned speeches seem to be clearly violative of it.
In a separate complaint of Model Code violation filed before the EC, the BJP accused the ruling Congress government in Rajasthan of issuing the letter of Intents (lOI) for 960 MW through the Rajasthan Rajya Vidyut Prasaran Nigam ltd, a public sector power distribution company on September 27.
The BJP charged that based on “extraneous deal” struck between bidders who have received the lOI and government of Rajasthan, in connivance with officials of RRVPNl, this has facilitated the issue of backdated lOIs which is violative of the model code of conduct as well as Standard Bidding Guidelines of Union Power Ministry.