Rahul battles storm: Digvijaya Singh said a 'ridiculous thing, no need of proof from Army'

Expected as it was, former Congress president Rahul Gandhi’s interaction with the media in Jammu, on Tuesday (January 24), saw him parrying a volley of questions on party colleague Digvijaya Singh’s demand for proof of the 2016 surgical strikes against Pakistan by the Indian Armed Forces.

With the BJP upping the ante against the Congress over Singh’s remarks, Rahul too took an uncharacteristically harsh stance against the former MP chief minister. “I do not agree at all with what Digvijaya Singh has said. We have full trust in our army and if the army does something, it does not need to give any proof… I completely disagree with his statement and this is also the view of the Congress party; those were Digvijaya Singh’s personal opinions and not our opinion,” Rahul said at the packed press conference.

Digvijaya’s statement

On Monday, while addressing a public meeting in Jammu as part of the ongoing Bharat Jodo Yatra, Singh, who is also the yatra’s national coordinator, had said, “they (the BJP) talk about the surgical strike; that we killed so many people but there is no proof. They are ruling only through peddling lies.” The comments had given BJP spin doctors fresh ammunition to attack Rahul and the Congress with by projecting Singh’s comments made against the Narendra Modi government’s claims over the surgical strikes as those that “questioned the valour of our armed forces”.

Also read: Digvijaya Singh questions surgical strikes; BJP calls it an ‘insult’ of Army

The Congress had promptly distanced itself from Singh’s remark. Congress communications department chief Jairam Ramesh had issued a statement saying Singh’s views were “his own and do not reflect the position of the Congress” and that his party “has supported and will continue to support all military actions that are in the national interest.”

BJP grabs opportunity

However, sundry BJP leaders – MP chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, former Union minister Ravi Shankar Prasad, party spokespersons Gaurav Bhatia and Shehzad Poonawalla, to name a few – have since used Singh’s remarks to attack the Congress and reassert that Rahul was on a Bharat Todo Yatra (a journey to break India) and not Bharat Jodo Yatra.

On Tuesday morning, Singh, while participating in the BJY foot march in Jammu along with Ramesh, tried to fend off the BJP’s blitz by asserting that he had the “greatest regard for our defence forces”. A visibly perturbed Ramesh was once again seen shoving aside reporters who were trying to quiz Singh and said that the party had already made a statement and the media should “go and ask questions to the Prime Minister”.

Rahul’s conference, however, was dominated by questions over the controversy stoked by Singh. The former Congress president spent over half of the 35 minute-long press conference responding to questions that ranged from what he thought of Singh’s remarks to how he would respond to the BJP’s renewed charges of the Congress being “pro-Pakistan” and if the former MP CM, with his penchant for making comments dubbed by the BJP as anti-national and critical of the armed forces, had nullified the gains that the Congress had made over the past four months of the Bharat Jodo Yatra.

The Wayanad MP sought to “assure” those criticising the Congress that “Digvijaya Singh’s views are outlying views and not views that are held by the centre of the party”. Rahul said the Congress, unlike the BJP, was a “democratic party and not a dictatorship” where “we don’t follow principles of coercion” but “allow conversations”.

‘Ridiculous thing’

“Sometimes when those conversations happen, people who have extreme views also air their views… In the BJP and RSS, there is no conversation… We think a conversation is very important and sometimes there are people in every conversation who say ridiculous things, and I am sorry to say this about a very senior leader that he said a ridiculous thing,” Rahul said. Singh, who is usually present at Rahul’s BJY press conferences, was conspicuous by his absence at Tuesday’s interaction.

Also read: Digvijaya Singh in firefighting mode as surgical strike row rages

With the BJP going all out to project Singh’s comments as being indicative of a “pattern in the Congress of attacking the Indian Armed Forces”, Rahul also asserted repeatedly that “we are absolutely crystal clear that the armed forces do a job; they do a job exceptionally well” and that the armed forces “do not need to be providing proof for anything”.

Responding to a question on whether the row triggered by Singh would derail the positive impact created by the Bharat Jodo Yatra, Rahul said, “I don’t think so. The yatra has achieved something fundamental and very powerful. What the yatra has done, and this cannot be changed now, is that it has shown that there are two visions of India. One is a hate-filled, arrogant, cowardly vision and the other is love-filled, embracing and brave vision… Millions of people have walked in the yatra… the yatra has changed the narrative in this country… One or two comments made by some leader cannot change that fundamental”.