Bengaluru: Karnataka Congress chief B K Hariprasad on Tuesday called the jailed student activist Umar Khalid a "nationalist".
He said the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP), which has opposed the screening of a documentary film on Khalid at the National Law School of India University (NLSIU), has no rights to speak on the jailed leader.
Khalid, arrested in September 2020, was booked under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) for being one of the "masterminds" of the February 2020 riots that had left 53 people dead and more than 700 injured in Delhi.
"Umar Khalid is a nationalist. The ABVP has no right to speak about Khalid because the ABVP adores Nathuram Godse, who was an anti-national and a terrorist — the first terrorist of the country. They have no moral right or moral standing to speak about Khalid," Hariprasad told reporters.
Reacting to the Congress state chief's statement, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS)-affiliated student organisation ABVP said it had "exposed the intellectual bankruptcy of the Congress leader."
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) too slammed Hariprasad for his statement saying that the Congress is redefining patriotism by calling those who want to divide India as “Nationalists”.