The BJP on Wednesday strongly countered the Opposition charges of linking the party with the killing of journalist Gauri lankesh to the party or people following its ideology by terming them as "irresponsible, baseless and false". At the same time, it also asked the Karnataka Government to swiftly probe the murder and arrest the guilty.
lashing out at statements of Congress Chief Sonia Gandhi and her deputy Rahul, Union Minister Nitin Gadkari said levelling "untrue" allegations against the BJP and the Prime Minister is injustice to his party and detrimental to democracy.
"The present Government, the BJP or any of its organisations have no connection with the killing of journalist Gauri lankesh," the Road Transport, Highways, Shipping and Water Resources Minister told reporters.
He said Prime Minister Narendra Modi is being accused of remaining silent despite people knowing that he is on a foreign visit.
"The reaction on this incident by the president of a political party is very irresponsible, baseless and false," Gadkari said without naming the Congress chief who has said that the killing is a chilling reminder that "intolerance and bigotry are raising their ugly head in our society".
Gadkari said that he condemned the incident but the manner in which the ruling party is being portrayed by some political parties was unfortunate and objectionable.
"If there is a murder and somebody is accused of it, unless and until there is any evidence, that person cannot be pronounced guilty. Some people have allergy with Bharatiya Janata Party.
"They are unable to digest the good work by the BJP under the leadership of Prime Minister. They are levelling such false and baseless allegations," the former BJP president said.
He said such "irresponsible and false" allegations "will cause harm to democracy" and any such projection that the BJP is linked to it is injustice to the party.
Gadkari hit out at Congress vice president Rahul, who had alleged that anybody who spoke against the ideology of the BJP and the RSS, was pressured, beaten and even killed.
The Congress leader also described Modi as a "skilled Hindutva politician" whose comments had one meaning for his supporters and another for the rest of the world.
Taking exception to the remarks, Gadkari said, "This is very unfortunate. The country's Prime Minister is not of one party and is the nation's honour. For a responsible leader of a political party, levelling such baseless and untrue allegation is unfortunate. It is not good for Indian democracy."
Gadkari, a former BJP president, said Modi was presently abroad to further the country's interests and it was unfortunate that such allegations were being levelled against him .
Earlier, another Central Minister Ananth Kumar targeted Chief Minister Siddaramaiah for what he said was the poor law and order situation in the Congress-led state.
He said there had been 18-19 political murders, including that of rationalist MM Kalburgi, in the State in the last two-and-a-half years.
"Senior journalist of Karnataka Gauri lankesh has been murdered mercilessly. We strongly condemn this heinous murder. We request the State Government and Chief Minister Siddaramaiah to do a swift probe, arrest the guilty quickly and punish them severely," Kumar, a lok Sabha member from Bengaluru, told reporters.
He said the Siddaramaiah Government had not succeeded in taking the murder investigations to their logical conclusions.
The Supreme Court, he added, had on Tuesday handed over the probe into the mysterious death of DSP Ganapathy to the CBI while questioning the State Government's investigation.