New Delhi: Union Home Minister Amit Shah has launched a strong counterattack on Congress leader Rahul Gandhi over his recent allegations regarding the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls. Responding to the opposition’s claims of electoral malpractice, Shah questioned whether the Congress party’s repeated electoral failures in Gujarat were a result of the SIR process.
Addressing the controversy on Tuesday, Shah advised the Leader of the Opposition to engage in serious introspection. “I want to ask Rahul Gandhi, did the Congress lose in Gujarat because of SIR?” Shah stated, highlighting that the grand old party has failed to win an election in the state for the past 41 years. He emphasised that losing continuously in a major state where the party once held power requires deep self-reflection rather than blaming the electoral system.
To further bolster his argument, the Home Minister cited the results of the recent by-elections held across West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, and Puducherry, pointing out that the Congress failed to secure a single seat. Sharing specific data, Shah noted that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) snatched the Nowgaon seat from the Congress with a massive margin of 1.42 lakh votes. In West Bengal’s Rejinagar, the BJP defeated the ruling Trinamool Congress by over 75,000 votes. Meanwhile, in Puducherry, the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) candidate from the AINRC secured a victory by 8,482 votes, restricting the Congress to a mere 22 per cent vote share.
Taking a sharp dig at the Congress leadership, Shah remarked that Gandhi should start mentally preparing for a fourth consecutive defeat in the upcoming 2029 general elections.
The sharp rebuttal from the ruling party comes in the wake of relentless attacks by Gandhi and the opposition INDIA bloc over the SIR process. Over the past few days, Gandhi has spearheaded protests, alleging widespread “vote theft” and the systematic destruction of the electoral process. The Congress leader has firmly demanded the resignation of Gyanesh Kumar, vowing that the opposition’s agitation will continue until accountability is fixed for what he described as the “murder of democracy.”