Following former Home Minister Shivraj Patil’s comment that the concept of jihad was not just in Islam but also in Bhagwat Gita and Christianity, the Congress on Friday said that the comments were unacceptable, while asserting that the scripture was a key foundational pillar of Indian civilisation.

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) had come down heavily on the Congress over Patil’s remarks, at the launch of Congress veteran and former Union minister Mohsina Kidwai’s biography, and accused the Congress party of playing vote bank politics.

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“My senior colleague Shivraj Patil reportedly made some comments on Bhagavad Gita that’s unacceptable. Subsequently, he clarified. The Congress’s stand is clear. Bhagavad Gita is a key foundational pillar of Indian civilisation,” Congress general secretary Jairam Ramesh said in a tweet.

Ramesh, in another tweet, shared excerpts from Jawaharlal Nehru’s book ‘The Discovery of India’, wherein the former prime minister wrote: “The message of the Gita is not sectarian or addressed to any particular school of thought. It is universal in its approach for everyone, Brahmin or outcaste.”

While speaking at the book launch event, the former Lok Sabha Speaker and Union minister Patil had said that the there is a lot of discussion about jihad in Islam.

“It is not just in Quran, but in Mahabharata also, the part in Gita, Shri Krishna also talks of jihad to Arjun and this thing is not just in Quran or Gita but also in Christianity,” he claimed in his remarks in Hindi, as quoted by news agency PTI.

“If after explaining everything, people are not understanding, they are coming with weapons then you cannot run, you cannot call that jihad and you cannot call it wrong, this is what must be understood, there should not be this concept of making people understand with weapons in hand,” the 87-year-old leader further said.

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Later, Patil clarifying his remarks, told ANI that, “In Hinduism, any person who kills a person who speaks the truth is Jihad. If you kill Mahatma Gandhi, that is Jihad. Who killed Mahatma Gandhi?…The person who killed him will be called Jihad.”