NEW DELHI: The ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Tuesday lambasted Leader of Opposition Rahul Gandhi for his ‘Sikh’ remarks and criticism of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) during his ongoing US visit.
Rahul, who is on a three-day US visit, had referred to Sikhism during one of his interactions and said, “The fight is not about politics. The fight is about whether a Sikh can wear his turban… it is for all religions.”
Reacting to the Congress leaders’s remarks, senior BJP leader and Union Minister Hardeep Singh Puri Tuesday accused the Gandhi scion of spreading a “dangerous narrative” abroad.
“I think there is something far more sinister… the people in front of him (at an event in the US where Mr Gandhi was speaking) were from my community. They eke out a living in the US, and don’t have a strong connection with the country. And to them Rahulji is spreading this false narrative…” Puri said while addressing a press conference on the issue.
The minister further added, “The other day he said, ‘there is a very large economy where there is no unemployment’… sometimes he says something else. He has also let loose a diatribe against the RSS… and this is made worse because he has gone there as Leader of Opposition and not as a.common citizen.”
Refering to 1984 anti-Sikh riots following the assassination of Rahul’s grandmother and former PM Indira Gandhi by her Sikh bodyguards, Puri said the only time Indian Sikhs’ faced an “existential threat” was when the Gandhi family was in power.
“I have been wearing a turban for over six decades and a kada for longer… and never had a problem….if there has been one time in our history as a community we have felt anxiety, and that is too mild a term, we have felt an existential threat… it was when Rahul Gandhi’s family was in power,” the BJP leader said.
He continued: “In 1984, a pogramme was carried out against the Sikhs. Three thousand innocent people were killed… dragged out of their homes, tires were put around them, and they were burned alive.”
Puri also referred to the statment of former PM and Rahul Gandhi’s father, Rajeev Gandhi, after the anti-Sikh riots, that “the earth shakes whenever a big tree falls” and said it was as close to “a justification for targeting a minority community as I have seen.”
Agencies

  BJP, Congress, Election

Agencies