New Delhi: The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Sunday announced that it will hold nationwide protests on Monday against the Congress president's "insulting, indecent and offensive" remarks against Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
The ruling party slammed Mallikarjun Kharge for his disparaging "personal" remarks against Modi, saying that the Congress chief is using language "associated with thugs and hooligans".
The party's strong reaction followed Kharge's outburst during a function on the 139th birth anniversary of Bihar's first chief minister, Shri Krishna Singh, in Patna, where he said that the Congress will send those involved in carrying out alleged irregularities in the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) process to jail.
"Modi ka baap bhi jayega, baap bhi jayega (Let alone Modi, even his father would go)," Kharge retorted from the dais, after a member of the audience interrupted the Congress chief's speech and shouted, “As long as there is no rebellion, Modi won’t go anywhere.”
BJP chief Nitin Nabin said the people of the country are watching this "indecent politics very closely and will give it a befitting reply in due time".
"The kind of indecent and unparliamentary language used today in Patna by Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge towards the country's honourable Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi ji reflects the Congress party's ideological bankruptcy," he said on X.
Nabin said political opposition too should have some dignity. "But dragging the departed family members into speeches from public platforms has now become the real 'culture' of Rahul Gandhi and the entire opposition," he said.
Home Minister Amit Shah said that Kharge has today "torn apart all norms of decorum by making an indecent remark about Modi ji's father in Patna".
"This is not the first time that the Congress party has used abusive language against Modi ji or his family. At times, they have hurled insults at his revered mother, at times called him 'merchant of death,' and at times mocked his poverty by calling him 'chaiwala'".
कांग्रेस अध्यक्ष मल्लिकार्जुन खरगे ने आज पटना में मोदी जी के पिताजी के बारे में अभद्र टिप्पणी कर सारी मर्यादाएँ तार-तार कर दी हैं।यह पहली बार नहीं है, जब कांग्रेस पार्टी ने मोदी जी या उनके परिवार को अपशब्द कहे हों। कभी उनकी पूजनीय माताजी के विषय में अपशब्द कहे, कभी उन्हें 'मौत का सौदागर' कहा, तो कभी 'चायवाला' कहकर उनकी गरीबी का उपहास उड़ाया। राहुल गांधी के नेतृत्व में कांग्रेस पार्टी हर रोज अभद्रता की सीमाएँ पार करती जा रही है।बीते 12 वर्षों में लगातार मिल रही चुनावी हार से कांग्रेस पार्टी में हताशा व निराशा इतनी बढ़ चुकी है कि अब उसके पास न कोई नीति बची है, न कोई मुद्दा, बस गाली-गलौज की राजनीति बची है। जनता के बीच जनाधार खो चुकी कांग्रेस, अब अपने कार्यकर्ताओं में भी आधार खोती जा रही है।जब-जब इन्होंने मोदी जी या उनके परिवार पर घृणित टिप्पणियाँ की हैं, तब-तब जनता ने कांग्रेस को करारा जवाब दिया है।
"Under Rahul Gandhi's leadership, the Congress party keeps crossing the limits of indecency every day. In the past 12 years, the repeated electoral defeats have bred such desperation and frustration in the Congress party that it no longer has any policy left, nor any issue -- only the politics of slander remains," he alleged.
Shah said Congress is now steadily losing its base even among its own workers. "Whenever they have made hateful comments against Modi ji or his family, the public has given Congress a resounding response every time," the former BJP chief said in a Hindi post on X.
Union minister J P Nadda condemned Kharge's remarks and said the Congress, frustrated by its repeated electoral defeats, is venting its "political resentment" by making disparaging comments against Prime Minister Modi and his family.
Such "indecent remarks" directed at the prime minister and his family not only reveal a profound lack of political decorum in the Congress leader but also constitute an insult to the people of the country, the former BJP president charged.
"The objectionable remark made by Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge against the late father of the Prime Minister Narendra Modi deserves the strongest possible condemnation," Nadda said on X.
"People of the country will surely deliver their response to such petty politics through democratic means," he added.
Nadda said the opposition's "panic", stemming from Modi's rising popularity at home and abroad, and the people's unwavering trust in him, is now plainly evident in its language and conduct.
"The Congress must realise that the trust of the people cannot be won through a politics of hatred and humiliation," Nadda said.