As Congress president Rahul Gandhi left for the Kailash Mansarovar pilgrimage on Friday, opting for the China route, the BJP launched a scathing attack on him questioning his ‘love’ for China.
BJP spokesman Sambit Patra at a Press conference asked the Congress party to define the kind of relationship that Rahul Gandhi enjoyed with China that the Chinese envoy came to IGI airport to see off the Congress chief.
“Yeh rishta kya kehlata hai,” the BJP leader asked quoting the first line of a Hindi film song. He also played a short video on the Congress president’s various comments made in India and abroad on China.
“We are not questioning his faith but the special relationship that Rahul Gandhi and his family has with China must be explained. During the Beijing Olympics, Sonia Gandhi, Priyanka and Robert Vadra were special invitees,” Patra said. The BJP spokesperson also questioned the Congress party’s readiness to get the Chinese perspective on various issues such as Dokhlam standoff rather than that of India’s.
“Rahulji has an obsession for China. Why is it that Mr Gandhi always wants to get a Chinese view on everything but does not want to have an Indian perspective?”
“Why is Mr Rahul Gandhi holding the brief of China across the globe? He advertises China as if he is the advertising man hired to advertise China,” the BJP leader charged.
Hitting out hard at Congress and the Gandhi family, Patra alleged that Rahul Gandhi had held a secret meeting with Chinese envoy during the Doklam standoff.
Patra said that if the Congress president had really wanted to know about Doklam, he could have asked the Ministry of External Affairs instead of meeting with the Chinese ambassador.
“During his recent Europe tour, he was asked about the Doklam issue. Rahul Gandhi refused to comment saying he has no knowledge about it. When you had no knowledge about it then how did you made such a serious allegation on the government?” Patra asked.
Patra said that Gandhi was behaving like a Chinese spokesperson rather than an Indian spokesperson and that he advertises China as if he had been hired by the Chinese government as its advertising man.
Patra further questioned Gandhi and asked which politicians will the Congress boss meet in China and what will he discuss.
Responding to the attacks made by Rahul Gandhi on the BJP-led government over the country’s economy, Patra said that he did not know from where does the Congress head get these ‘comic figures’ on the Indian economic scenario.
Meanwhile, Congress spokesperson Randeep Singh Surjewala asked what’s wrong with Gandhi going for the pilgrimage.
The Congress president, who will be leaving for the Kailash Mansarovar Yatra on Friday, had on Thursday said that the Narendra Modi government had implemented demonetisation only to help its ‘crony capitalist friends’.
The Congress scion is likely to undertake the pilgrimage during the first week of September.
Gandhi, who has often spoken about being a ‘Shiv Bhakt’ or devotee of Lord Shiva, had expressed his desire to go for the Kailash Mansarovar Yatra after his airplane plunged 8,000 feet while he was travelling to campaign for the Karnataka elections.