Congress accuses govt of 'headline manipulation' to divert attention from Satyapal Malik's allegations on Pulwama

New Delhi: The Congress on Sunday accused the central government of indulging in "headline manipulation" and diverting attention from former Jammu and Kashmir governor Satypal Malik's allegations over the 2019 Pulwama attack.

Congress general secretary Jairam Ramesh alleged on Twitter that the "Modi machine" has quickly either suppressed the "revelations" or diverted attention from them by generating other headlines and debates, an apparent reference to the narrative around the killing of gangster-turned-politician Atiq Ahmad and his brother Ashraf.

The BJP has cited Malik's past remarks, including the one that mocked former Congress chief Rahul Gandhi as a "political juvenile", and slammed him as the "disgraced governor of Jammu and Kashmir".

BJP's I-T department head Amit Malviya had on Saturday tweeted an old remark of Malik, who has become a strong critic of the government in recent years, praising Prime Minister Narendra Modi as the "best PM" for Jammu and Kashmir, to hit out at his "U-turn".

Congress' media department head Pawan Khera also slammed the government on Sunday, saying questions do not vanish by "headline manipulation".

He said, "Questions only increase. Why clean chit to China? Why no JPC on Adani? Where did 20K crores come from in Adani's shell companies? Why no answers on Pulwama?"

Senior Congress leader and MP Shashi Tharoor put out a Twitter thread summarising the "revelations" made by Malik which he said had been "under-reported" by the media.

Tharoor said the "revelations" were on matters of national security which ought to be of concern to the nation.

"There is no national security interest involved in suppressing the story, only the political interests of the ruling party. The media should press GoI for an honest admission of failure and corrective action. The 40 jawans won't come back to us but they and our nation deserve the truth," Tharoor said.

The Congress had on Saturday demanded that the Centre reveal the outcome of the probe into the 2019 Pulwama incident in which 40 CRPF jawans were killed and asked why the paramilitary personnel were "denied" aircraft and made to commute by road despite the terror attack threat.

Ramesh had accused the BJP-led Union government of "minimum governance and maximum silence" and sought its response to the allegations made by Malik, who was the governor of Jammu and Kashmir at the time of the Pulwama terror attack.

There has been no reaction from the government since Malik's interview to a news portal was released, while the BJP has said that there were serious questions about his credibility and cited various statements made by him in recent years.

Sharing a clip of a recent interview, in which Malik withdrew a controversial comment he claimed Home Minister Amit Shah had made, Malviya had said Malik admitted to "lying and making up baseless stories on what Home Minister Amit Shah had said about Prime Minister Modi".

"No one took him seriously even when he made these allegations back then. But it raises serious questions on his credibility," he had added.