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BJP like Kauravas, says Rahul; Nirmala calls it 'rhetoric of loser'

New Delhi: Recalling the two warring sides of the epic Mahabharat, Congress president Rahul Gandhi on Sunday said the BJP, like the Kauravas, fought for power, while his party, on the lines of the Pandavas, battled for truth.
Taking the ruling BJP on, Gandhi said the party sought to divert people's attention from issues such as unemployment and farm distress with "fancy events".
"Instead of acknowledging the challenges facing the nation, Prime Minister Narendra Modi diverts our attention from our problems. We are being told that our problems only exist in our imagination," he said.
The BJP-RSS's goal was power, Gandhi stressed at the Congress party's plenary session here.
"Like the Kauravas, the BJP and RSS fight for power. Like the Pandavas, the Congress fights for truth," he said.
Gandhi held that his party spoke on behalf of the country.
"The BJP is the voice of an organisation; Congress is the voice of a nation," he said.
The Congress leader added that the corrupt and powerful today "control conversation" in the country and the "name Modi symbolises the collusion between crony capitalists and the prime minister".
Gandhi voiced the hope that India would in the next decade play an all-important role on the global stage.
"There are two visions in the world – of US and China. In 10 years, I want to see India's vision there," he said.
In his address, he assured party workers that he would break walls between them and leaders and vowed to fill the Congress stage with "talented youngsters".
He stressed the need for discipline, and said, "Let us put all differences aside and work together to ensure victory for the party".
Senior BJP leader and Union Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Sunday brushed off the scathing series of accusations made by Congress chief Rahul Gandhi, calling it the "rhetoric of loser, devoid of substance" and following it up with a point-by-point rebuttal.
Minutes after Gandhi's address at the 84th plenary session of the Congress, in which he took on Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the BJP and its chief Amit Shah, the defence minister addressed the media. Accusing the Gandhi of insulting the Hindus with his reference to religion and his party of being anti-technology for its insistence on a return to ballot paper, she left the most crucial points for the last.
Referring to Gandhi's remarks on party chief Amit Shah, Sitharaman said: "It is astonishing that the Congress president chooses to name the president of BJP and says he is a murder accused. A court has cleared him. The charge does not hold, even though the charge was a complete conspiracy against him. It was a conspiracy based on fraud, and you continue to say this".
The accusation, she added, was being made by someone who shares his surname with Mahatma Gandhi, and is out on bail in the National Herald case.
Gandhi and his mother Sonia Gandhi are facing allegations that they used their leadership of the Congress to misuse party funds for personal profit. They are accused of setting up a shell company called Young Indians to illegally gain control of properties worth $300 million that belonged to Associated Journals, which published the National Herald, a newspaper founded by Jawaharlal Nehru. On Gandhi's accusations that the government was curbing the independence of the media and judiciary, Sitharaman politely reminded the Congress leader of the Emergency imposed his grandmother, former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, and the controversial defamation bill, seen as an instrument to curb free speech, planned by the
government led by his father, Rajiv Gandhi. See also p5
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