Sonia targets Modi over 'neech' barb

Narendra Modi was today at the receiving end of 'neech (low-level)' barb again, this time from Congress PresidentSonia Gandhi, who berated his "insult" of Rajiv Gandhi and said such "low-level" thought and words does not behove him and national politics.

Sonia also invoked former Prime Minister and ailing BJP leader Atal Bihari Vajpayee to hit out at Modi, saying Vajpayee and other former PMs maintained the dignity of the post but the way Modi criticised Rajiv Gandhi could not be termed anything but petty.

The BJP Prime Ministerial candidate had said Rajiv, a former PM, had publicly humiliated a Congress chief minister when he was the party's general secretary to claim it was the ruling party leaders who practiced the politics of anger and arrogance and not him.

Modi's severe criticism of the Gandhi family in his rally at Amethi, from where Sonia's son and Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi is contesting election, had prompted Rahul's sister Priyanka to accuse him of practicing "neech rajniti" (low-level politics). Modi, in turn, accused Congress of targeting his lower caste origin.

"I will say that he (Modi) must keep in mind this great country's rich culture and generosity. Such 'neech' thought and words do not behove him... If such are his words, you can well understand what will be his action," Sonia said at an election rally in the UP town.

She lambasted his "false" claims about Gujarat's development and said 40 percent people in the state's villages do not get water for drinking and irrigation.

Gujarat, she said hitting out at the the state's CM, still considers those earning below a paltry sum of Rs 11 per day as poor and even by such low base over 40 lakh families there are poor.

"If this becomes the condition of the whole country, then you can understand what will happen," she said.