Daijiworld Media Network - New Delhi
New Delhi, Nov 10: The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has intensified its attack on the Congress amid the political controversy surrounding revelations in former Congress president Sonia Gandhi's memoir, accusing the party leadership of pursuing vote-bank politics and remaining silent on the Bofors corruption scandal.
BJP spokesperson Pradeep Bhandari said the memoir had exposed the vote-bank politics of the Gandhi-Vadra family but failed to address allegations of corruption linked to the Bofors case, which has continued to haunt the Congress decades after it surfaced in the late 1980s.
"The Gandhi-Vadra family's habit of vote-bank politics has been exposed in Sonia Gandhi's book, but it doesn't answer on the blatant corruption in the Bofors case," Bhandari said.
He alleged that the Congress had never distanced itself from such issues in its political approach and claimed that this mindset was responsible for the party's electoral defeats in the 2014, 2019 and 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
He further predicted that the same approach would lead to another electoral setback for the Congress in the 2029 general elections.
Speaking to the media, Bhandari said that despite the Bofors controversy remaining a matter of public debate for several decades, Sonia Gandhi had maintained silence on the issue.
"Instead of apologising for corruption or addressing the issue of vote-bank politics, she has chosen to perpetuate the same mindset in her book," he alleged.
The BJP spokesperson also criticised Congress MP Imran Masood over his remarks concerning Diwali, claiming that those driven by vote-bank politics could never genuinely respect Sanatan Dharma.
Referring to Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge's controversial remark comparing Diwali with "Khushiyon ki Eid", Bhandari alleged that it reflected the Congress' "anti-Sanatan" mindset. He also recalled the controversy surrounding remarks describing the Hindu community as violent.
Linking Masood's comments to what he termed the Congress' political strategy, Bhandari alleged that the party supported offering namaz on public streets while comparing the festival of Diwali to a "disease".
He claimed that such an approach would work against the Congress in the upcoming Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections as well as the 2029 Lok Sabha elections, predicting a major electoral defeat for the party.