Taking a vile swipe, Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge on Thursday likened Prime Minister Narendra Modi to a poisonous snake. Speaking during a rally at Karnataka’s Kalaburagi, Kharge said, “PM Modi is like a poisonous snake. You might think it’s poison or not. If you lick it, you’re dead.”
Soon after the remark, the BJP took strong objection to the derogatory comments by the Congress president and demanded Kharge’s apology to the nation for using such language for the prime minister.
Reacting to Kharge’s remark, Union Minister Anurag Thakur said Kharge’s statement was “worse than the one given by Sonia Gandhi. “Congress made Mallikarjun Kharge the party president but nobody considers him that, so he thought of giving a statement which is worse than that given by Sonia Gandhi.” Thakur was referring to the UPA chairperson’s infamous ‘maut ka saudagar’ (merchant of death) remark on Modi.
BJP leader and Union minister Shobha Karandlaje wondered to what level Congress will stoop in order to target the Prime Minister. “What does he (Kharge) want to tell the world? PM Narendra Modi is the PM of our country and the whole world respects him and using such language for the PM shows the level to which the Congress has stooped. We want him (Kharge) to apologise to the country,” she said.
Kharge retracts
After facing backlash from BJP leaders, Kharge backtracked and said his comments were not for PM Modi and he meant that the BJP’s ideology was “like a snake”.
“I never said this personally for PM Modi, what I said was their (BJP) ideology is like a snake and if you try to touch it, your death is certain,” Kharge later clarified.