NEW DELHI: The Congress on Wednesday condemned what it termed attempts to cast insinuations and innuendos’ against former Vice-President of India Hamid Ansari.
While Ansari refuted the reports and the charges as a “litany of falsehood”, Congress slammed the ruling party saying insinuations by its leaders are “character assassination of the worst form”.
The strong rebuttal from the Congress came after Bharatiya Janata Party spokesperson Gaurav Bhatia said that Nusrat Mirza, a Pakistani journalist, has made a disclosure that Ansari invited him five times to India between 2005-2011. He also claimed that he had shared the information he collected during his visits with Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI).
“We should not forget that the (vice president’s) post is Constitutional and there are many issues that cannot be shared as they are linked to the nation’s security,” Bhatia alleged.
Hitting back at the BJP, in a statement, senior Congress leader and general Secretary in charge of Communications Jairam Ramesh said that insinuations and innuendos by a spokesperson of the BJP against Congress interim chief Sonia Gandhi and former Vice President Hamid Ansari are to be condemned in the strongest possible language.
“The facts regarding the International Conference of Jurists on International Terrorism and Human Rights held on December 11, 2010, in New Delhi are already in the public domain. The insinuations and innuendos of the spokesperson of the BJP are character assassination of the worst form,” Ramesh said.
He said that the levels that the Prime Minister and his party colleagues will stoop to debase public debate and spread their patented brand of lies are staggering.
“It reflects sickness of mind and lack of any form of integrity whatsoever,” he added.