MP and party's candidate from Gorakhpur Lok Sabha seat Ravi Kishan said that "India at present is not the India that was under Congress" while reacting to Congress leader Mani Shankar Aiyar's remarks on respecting Pakistan.
"At this time Pakistan is collecting foodgrains for itself. They are facing a food crisis...Mani Shankar Aiyar should get himself treated somewhere. This is not the India of Congress. Now, India is very powerful. This is the India of PM Modi...", Ravi Kishan said.
Aiyar, a former diplomat and vocal advocate of normalising India-Pakistan relations, stated that the government can talk tough to Islamabad if it wants to, but if it doesn’t respect the neighbouring country, it may have to pay a heavy price. In his statement, Aiyar warned that India should not flex its military muscles as it may irk Islamabad into deploying nuclear weapons against New Delhi.
"They have atom bombs. We have them too, but if a ‘madman’ decides to drop a bomb on Lahore, it won’t take 8 seconds for the radiation to reach Amritsar," he warned.
"If we respect them, they will remain peaceful. But if we snub them, what happens if a ‘madman’ comes up and decides to launch bombs [at India]?" Aiyar asked.
In a veiled dig at Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Aiyar said, "In order to become the vishwaguru, no matter how serious our issues with Pakistan are, we have to show that we are working hard to resolve them. But in the last 10 years, there has been no hard work [to this end]."
The Congress leader's remarks came against the backdrop of heightened tensions between India and Pakistan after PM Modi's 'ghar me ghus kar...' warning where he said Indian forces would enter Pakistan to kill anyone who escapes over the border.
Other senior BJP leaders have also dialled up the anti-Pakistan rhetoric. Defence Minister Rajnath Singh asserted that Pakistan-occupied-Kashmir (PoK) "was, is, and will remain ours". India won't have to capture it because its people, on their own, would want to be part of India, Singh added.
Earlier, National Conference (NC) chief and former Jammu and Kashmir CM Farooq Abdullah also highlighted Pakistan's nuclear capabilities. "Remember, they (Pakistan) are also not wearing bangles. It has atom bombs, and unfortunately, that atom bomb will fall on us,” he warned.
Controversy riles Congress
Of late, senior Congress leaders like Sam Pitroda, Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury and now Mani Shankar Aiyar courted controversy with their remarks.
Pitroda, speaking about India’s diversity, said that “people in the East look like Chinese, people in the West look like Arabs, people in the North look like white, and people in the South look like Africans”. He was talking about Indians co-existing in a “very happy environment” for 75 years.
Pitroda later resigned as the chairman of the Indian Overseas Congress was accepted by Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge.
On May 9, West Bengal Congress chief Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury in an interview said "there are people of proto australoid type, negrita type class in our country, some are like "Mongolians", some are black, some are white..."
In another instance, Kantilal Bhuria, a former Union Minister and Congress Lok Sabha candidate from Ratlam, Madhya Pradesh, courted controversy with his poll promise of Rs 2 lakh to those who have two wives if his party comes to power.
If Congress comes to power, as our manifesto states, every woman will get Rs 1 lakh in her bank account. Women from each household will receive Rs 1-1 lakh. Those who have two wives will get Rs 2 lakh..." Bhuria said while addressing a poll rally in Ratlam.