'Rahul Gandhi Vivaadon Ki Aandhi...': Anurag Thakur Attacks Congress MP After Cambridge Lecture

New Delhi: Union Minister Anurag Thakur on Monday (March 6, 2023) attacked Congress MP Rahul Gandhi and said that he has become a "vivaadon ki aandhi" (a storm of controversies). The senior Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader also alleged that Gandhi has taken "a contract to defame India" from a foreign land. Gandhi's recent remarks at Cambridge University in England that "Indian democracy is under attack" and several politicians, including himself, are under surveillance, has triggered a political slugfest with the ruling BJP accusing him of denigrating India.

"Rahul Gandhi has taken a contract to defame India from a foreign land. His language, thoughts, and work style are suspicious. He has done it again and again...," Anurag Thakur told news agency ANI.

"Rahul Gandhi vivaadon ki aandhi ban chuke hain. Be it, foreign friends, agencies, or foreign land, he's leaving no stone unturned to defame India. To hide his failures, he has taken a contract to defame India from a foreign land in a pre-planned manner," Thakur added.

#WATCH | "...Rahul Gandhi has taken contract to defame India from foreign land. His language, thoughts & work style are suspicious. He has done it again & again...when jawans were martyred, he said, a few people killed in car bomb explosion..," says Union Minister Anurag Thakur pic.twitter.com/YBW8aiz3cG — ANI (@ANI) March 6, 2023

Earlier last week, Rahul Gandhi gave a lecture on "Learning to Listen in the 21st century" at the Cambridge Judge Business School and listed five key aspects of the alleged attack on Indian democracy -- capture and control of media and judiciary; surveillance and intimidation; coercion by federal law enforcement agencies; attacks on minorities, Dalits and tribals; and shutting down of dissent.

Referencing a decline in manufacturing in democratic countries such as India and the US in recent years as production shifted to China, the former Congress President said the shift had produced mass inequality and anger which needed urgent attention and dialogue.

"We simply cannot afford a planet that doesn't produce under democratic systems," the 52-year-old, who is on a week-long tour of the UK, had said.