Rahul defends 'neechi rajniti' barb by Priyanka

 Facing a tough challenge from his rivals, Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi remained present in Amethi Lok Sabha constituency on the polling day on Wednesday and was seen visiting polling centres.

While his opponents claimed that Rahul visited Amethi on the polling day for the first time and termed it as an ‘indication of nervousness’, Rahul said that he had visited the constituency on the polling day in 2004 as well.

The Congress leader defended the ‘neechi rajniti’ barb on the BJP prime ministerial nominee Narendra Modi by his sister Priyanka Gandhi and said that it had nothing to do with caste.

“Neech karm hoten hain..jati nahin...neech soch hoti hai” (the deeds and thinking are lowly not the caste), Rahul quipped.

Modi had on Tuesday sought to make a counter attack on Priyanka saying that her barb was ‘in fact an insult to an entire caste’ and reflected ‘arrogance’.

“I have been born in a lower caste....is it a crime?...I have been insulted...an entire caste has been insulted”, Modi said in his meetings in an apparent bid to corner Priyanka and Congress and woo the backward castes in the region.

Priyanka had hit out at the saffron leader saying that he had ‘insulted’ her ‘martyred father’ and the people of Amethi would ‘never forgive’ him for that. 

“They have insulted my martyred father on this land (Amethi)....the people of Amethi will never forgive them for this neech rajniti (low level politics)”, Priyanka had said.