00:05And now it seems it's the turn of the BJP to reply back and Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal
00:12has now commented on Malikarjan Kharge and what he said. Now he says we feel ashamed that the
00:19Congress party has come to such a low level. Piyush Goyal goes on to say that a democratically
00:26elected Prime Minister who has been elected by the people of the country. He is being called a
00:32terrorist by Malikarjan Kharge. He goes on to strongly condemn all the statements that have
00:38been made by Malikarjan Kharge and demands an apology for what he calls an insult to the people
00:44of India. He said that they did not only insult the Prime Minister but they have insulted 142
00:50crores, Indians and also the millions. Now, Malikarjan Kharge had made a comment about
00:59Prime Minister during a press conference where he called him a terrorist. He said that he
01:05has multiple agencies in his hand and he uses them to terrorize other people and that's why
01:11he is calling him a terrorist. Now this has not gone down well with the BJP and its leaders.
01:17In fact, Piyush Goyal has demanded an apology and he has said that people of Tamil Nadu will
01:24not forgive Rahul Gandhi and Malikarjan Kharge and even the DMK Chief and current Chief Minister
01:31M.K. Stalin for what Malikarjan Kharge has said and that is targeting Prime Minister and targeting,
01:39not just targeting him but calling him a terrorist, calling him a liar and also calling him anti-women
01:46and anti-poor. So clearly now battle lines are drawn between the two parties. Joining us
01:55live right now is India Today's Pramod Madhav. Pramod, clearly this is becoming a bigger issue
02:02now with Union Minister Piyush Goyal also jumping in. Do tell us how is the local politics or rather
02:09the state politics reacting to it?
02:12Well, this is quite a bit shocker where the leader of the Congress party, also like Manikar
02:17Kharge, who is a senior leader as well, going ahead and using a particular term like this against the
02:22Prime Minister, then to trying to, you know, using the last phase of the campaign where he wanted to
02:27kind of emphasize how could a party like Anna Kavita, Monecha Garagam, which carries the name of
02:32Anand Durai, can go ahead and align with BJP, especially now trying to say that the party is
02:38against any kind of development, especially women development, that kind of allegations.
02:42And then he goes ahead and claims that he did not try to, I mean, want to use the word
02:46terrorist
02:46in that manner, but he only tried to say that PM Modi is threatening the other party leaders
02:51with agencies like TBI, IT and ED. And he also claiming that these kind of continuous,
02:57you know, threat and terrorizing is what he tried to mean. Even though he wants to provide
03:00a clarification like that, BJP, like you said earlier, it's not going to accept it.
03:05And they are like firing back right now.
03:08Right, Pramod. Clearly, this is now becoming a much bigger political issue.
03:13And although Malikar Kharge in that very same press conference, it feels, goes on to explain,
03:20as you rightly pointed out, that what did he mean by saying terrorist when he called Prime
03:24Minister Modi a terrorist? But Malikar Kharge has had a tendency to use certain phrases.
03:32And we've seen that earlier also that he has targeted Prime Minister Modi.
03:35Can you tell us a few instances of that?
03:38It surely is, Anjali. And you know, Congress is one of the biggest criticizers of BJP.
03:45And considering we have the elections over here in the state of Tamil Nadu, Prime Minister
03:48has visited the state of Tamil Nadu multiple times. Now, Congress leaders are also in the
03:53state of Tamil Nadu. And the biggest allocation they have against BJP is that even Rahul Gandhi
03:57has emphasized it, which also Malikar Kharge was talking about, is that AIDMK has been
04:02completely swallowed by BJP. This is the stance of Congress over here. And what Congress wants
04:08to say is that now earlier AIDMK leaders like Jelda are in the state of Tamil Nadu.
04:11Right, Pramod, we will continue this conversation, but we are now getting the comment that Piyush
04:16Goel has made. Let's listen in.
04:18Today, I feel ashamed that the Congress party and Mr. Stalin's DMK party have come to such
04:29a low level. They have stooped to this low level that a democratically elected Prime Minister
04:37of India, elected by the people of India. They are calling a terrorist. I strongly condemn
04:49Mr. Kharge's statement. I demand an apology from both the partners, Rahul Gandhi and M.K.
05:02Stalin, for this downright insult of the people of India. They have not only insulted Prime Minister
05:16Narendra Modi, who is elected by all of us, who is the leader of the world's biggest democracy,
05:25the mother of all democracies. But they have insulted 140 crore Indians. They have today
05:35insulted 8 crore Tamil brothers and sisters by calling the nation's Prime Minister a terrorist.
05:44And joining us on the phone line is BJP's N.V. Subhash. Thank you very much, Mr. Subhash,
05:49for speaking with India today. You've heard the comments that Malikarjun Kharge has made.
05:54How is your party planning to counter that?
05:58The mindset of the Congress party has been very clearly shown now because they are so frustrated.
06:05They don't have any other words to comment in politics during election time and we can comment,
06:13we can talk about it. We can talk about the party line or the party programs and the schemes.
06:22But, you know, taking the Prime Minister of, you know, he's the Prime Minister of our country.
06:28He belongs to the Congress party also, you know, the Prime Minister of our country,
06:32calling him as a terrorist, where Modiji has been very clearly eliminating the terrorists in this country.
06:39The whole world is watching. Why can't, you know, the Congress people come to line and then,
06:44you know, the mindset has been completely gone. And then he's now so frustrated.
06:50I don't know what made him to call about the terrorists.
06:54By aligning with AADMK, he's still calling about the terrorists. And what about the DMK?
07:02In Tamil, you know, the terrorists and the Sri Lankan Tamil, and so many other issues, you know,
07:09they killed their own Prime Minister, you know, the Prime Minister of Mr. Rajiv Gandhi.
07:13And this kind of a comment, we demand, you know, the Malikar and Karikar to withdraw the words.
07:19Right.
07:19Right, Mr. Smarsh.
07:20Apology to the nation. You should give an apology.
07:22Right. Thank you very much for speaking with India today.
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