Charges against me 'political witch-hunt' to distract people: Robert Vadra

Former Congress president Sonia Gandhi's son-in-law Robert Vadra on Monday termed the land scam charges against him as a "political witch-hunt" and claimed they have been brought up only to distract attention from the support to Rahul Gandhi's Bharat Jodo Yatra.

He denied the allegations against him relating to the alleged land scam in Rajasthan as "baseless."

"When the country is supporting us, this government will try to create some negativity but the people are very intelligent and understand that this is all political witch-hunt and distraction," he told PTI when asked about the allegations against him.

"These issues are eight years old, it was the time of the BJP government that they had given the land to some other people, people that I don’t even know," Vadra claimed.

“We have asked the court to clear this matter but the court said that we can not remove this issue because you are not an accused and this case will go on.

"This is very clear that they have brought up an issue which is baseless and basically to distract from all the good things because of Rahul Gandhi and the country is joining us," Vadra said referring to the Bharat Jodo Yatra.

Vadra added that the Congress is taking up every issue that the BJP is trying to hide and push under the carpet.

He also claimed that the people are fed up with the "divisive Hindu-Muslim agenda" that the BJP keeps raking up, noting that it is not good for the country.

"We are a secular country and that is our ideology," he said.

"They will always use wrong issues on me, issues which are baseless, accusations will come up against me just to distract, we are strong, we have the strength of the people," he said.

Vadra has been accused by the BJP of being involved in a land scam in Rajasthan's Bikaner, while the Congress party has claimed that he is a "victim of fraud."