Jaitley: Cong trying to communalise ’14 polls
Attacking the Congress over its leader Shakeel Ahmed’s remarks that the 2002 Gujarat riots led to the creation of the terror outfit Indian Mujahideen (IM), the BJP on Monday said it was a desperate strategy for electoral gains.
The party claimed Mr Ahmed went to the “extraordinary extent of rationalising the formation and existence of the IM, which is admittedly a terrorist organisation”. The RSS also attacked Mr Ahmed by saying he was “acting like IM’s spokesperson” and “Congress is the fountainhead of all forms of terrorism in India”.
In an article on his website, the Leader of the Opposition in the Rajya Sabha Arun Jaitley hit out at the Congress spokesperson for seeking to “rewrite history by his desperate attempt to communalise the issue of national security”.
“Serious political observers are at a loss to understand why the official spokesperson of the Congress party could have rationalised the formation of Indian Mujahideen in India...” Mr Jaitley said. He said the UPA is facing crisis of governance and lack of leadership and it appears that in a desperate strategy it wants to deflect the agenda to communalising the polity.
On Mr Ahmed’s remarks, Mr Jailtey said, “His effort is to somehow paint Indian Mujahideen as an organisation of the aggrieved who are victims of riots in Gujarat. He ignores the international context and Pakistan’s strategy behind the creation of Indian Mujahideen. This is yet another desperate attempt to communalise an issue of national security.”
He said the UPA in its 10th year of existence is confronted with a huge anti-incumbency and there is a “visible leadership failure”.
RSS leader Ram Madhav tweeted “Shakeel Ahmed’s justification of terrorism is shocking. It is the Congress brand politics that has bred all forms of terror in India.”
Mr Jaitley cited three “visible indicators” of “a crude attempt by the UPA leaders” to communalise 2014 electoral agenda, with Modi-bashing being one, CBI’s handling in the Ishrat Jahan case being another and the Congress spokesperson’s statement on IM being the third.
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