BJP complains to EC, says "Rahul Gandhi's Shakti remark is assault on dignity of women"

NEW DELHI: The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Wednesday approached the Election Commission (EC) to lodge a complaint against Rahul Gandhi's 'Shakti' remark for allegedly hurting Hindu religious sentiments. In the letter submitted to the poll commission, the BJP said that a call for fight against Shakti and spreading misinformation regarding the authenticity and independent functioning of the EVMs amounts to an 'assault on the dignity of women as well as goes against the ethics and values promoted by the Constitution of India'.

The row erupted on Sunday following Gandhi's remarks during the campaign conclusion speech in Mumbai's Shivaji Ground. "There is a word 'Shakti' in Hinduism. We are fighting against Shakti. The question is, what is Shakti? The soul of the king is in the EVM.

This is true. The soul of the king is in the EVM and every institution of the country, in the ED, CBI and Income Tax Department," Gandhi said. Many INDIA bloc leaders attended the event in a show of strength of the Opposition's alliance. Following the BJP's allegations, Gandhi took to social media platform 'X' (formerly Twitter), alleging that his statement was taken out of context. "Modi ji does not like my words. He tries to twist my statements and change the meaning because he knows that I have spoken a deep truth," Gandhi said.

The BJP, however, in its complaint, alleged that the remarks made by Gandhi is an attempt to spread misinformation amongst the voters and were antithetical to the values promoted by our Constitution. "It is submitted that such misdemeanors and blatant and brazen attacks on EVMs are concerted attempts to vitiate the social and political atmosphere of the country and also an attempt to spread misinformation amongst the voters and is antithetical to the values promoted by our Constitution," the BJP said, adding, "If such speeches are left un checked, they might raise fatal gigantic wages of unfounded allegations and fake news and all attempts should be made to ensure that the elections remain free from such phenomenon".

The BJP also claimed that the statement by Gandhi promotes "enmity against" Hinduism by "furthering ideas of division and spreading false and manipulative narratives during electoral times". "The objective behind highlighting the statements made by Rahul Gandhi is to depict that he has become defiant and is constantly indulging in casting aspersions on the EVM despite the Supreme Court consistently upholding the independence and the authenticity of the same," the party said.

As the term 'Shakti' is traditionally associated with the female deity and women folk in India, thus along with hurting the religious sentiments, it also has an underlying misogynistic tone, the BJP said in its complaint.

"Rahul Gandhi may be instructed to offer an unconditional public apology and retraction for his utterances at Shivaji Park event in Mumbai," the BJP said. It also demanded to ECI to direct X to suspend the official handle of INC for "spreading this fake news".

"Issue a direction to INC and Rahul Gandhi to refrain from posting publishing, advertising and propagating the said false information through any and all means of communication either spoken, written, audio/virtually representation," it added. Union minister Hardeep Singh Puri, who met Election Commission officials in New Delhi, to lodge the complaint said he "read out the exact thing" said by Rahul. "We made a detailed presentation ... He [Rahul Gandhi] insulted the religious sentiments of a lot of people. He insulted 'Nari Shakti'