Taking credit for the Indian Air Force strikes in Balakot, BJP president Amit Shah on Wednesday played the national security card and lambasted Congress president Rahul Gandhi before a 5,000-plus crowd in Dhanbad and a 8,000-plus crowd in Jamshedpur, both of which go to polls in the sixth phase of polls (third for Jharkhand) on May 12.
In both seats, the BJP’s sitting MPs P.N. Singh (Dhanbad) and Bidyut Baran Mahto (Jamshedpur) are fighting anti-incumbency, which may have caused Shah to amp up the shrill rhetoric of the campaigns in the scorching summer.
A day after over 15,000 people gathered for Rahul in Dhanbad, Shah at the Karkend Nehru Park attacked the erstwhile Congress government of staying silent when any “Alia, Malia, Jamalia entered the country and insulted our soldiers”, referring to Pakistan. Shah is known to use this phrase “Alia, Malia, Jamalia” in various poll campaigns.
He said after India’s Balakot attack, a pall of gloom hung over Pakistan and Rahul Gandhi also had a long face (Rahul baba ka chehra latka hua tha).
Shah said that Manmohan Singh (Prime Minister in the UPA government) stayed quiet like “Mauni Baba” but after the Pulwama terror attack, Modi displayed his 56-inch chest and immediately called the air force, which penetrated deep into Pakistan and demolished enemies into pieces.
“Modiji ke netritrwa mein Bharat videsh ki dharti par badla lene wala tisra desh bana (Led by Modi, India became the third country in the world to take revenge on foreign turf,” Shah said, saying only America and Israel had done so earlier.
“Main batana chahta hun ki agar Pakistan ke taraf se goli aayegi to yahan se gola jayega, eent ka jawab patthar se diya jagyega (I want to say that if a bullet comes from Pakistan, a bomb will go from here, we will reply to bricks with stones),” the BJP president said in his 25-minute address from 12.30pm. “For us, national security is of paramount importance and we won’t compromise on it.”
He added, “Congress and its alliance partners such as JMM are supporting National Conference whose leader Omar Abdullah says that there should be another Prime Minister for Kashmir,” he charged, adding if the Modi government came to power again it will repeal Article 370 in Kashmir. He claimed that when their (BJP) government brought the NRC (National Register of Citizens) in Assam, Rahul and his supporters raised a hue and cry in Rajya Sabha. “I assure you that if our government comes into power we will deport all ghuspetiyon (infiltrators) from the across the length and breadth of the country.”
In Jamshedpur’s Agrico, Shah’s rhetoric was more or less the same. But Shah compared the Congress 3G (Sonia, Rahul and Priyanka Gandhi) with the BJP 3G (Gaon or village, Gaumata or cow and Ganga)and accused the Congress of proposing to scrap the sedition law to help the tukde tukde gang (gang of splitters, referring to JNU protesters, including now Lok Sabha candidate from Begusarai Kanhaiya Kumar).
“Rahul aur Hemant aatankhvadiyon ke saath ILU ILU kare hamen koi matlab nahin (We don’t care if Rahul Gandhi and Hemant Soren say ILU to terrorists)”, he added, referring to the song in the old film Saudagar where ILU was shorthand for I love you. He also said, “Ghuspetiyon ko Kashmir se Kanyakumari tak aur Kalkatta se Kutch tak chun chun kar bhagayenge (will drive out infiltrators from Kashmir to Kanyakumari and Calcutta to Kutch).”
Speaking about the BJP’s achievements in Dhanbad and Jamshedpur, Shah in the latter venue had words of praise for BJP aspirant and MP Bidyut Baran. “He may look like a simple man, but has raised a lot of questions for his constituency in Parliament.”