Party leaders also dismissed the turnout, saying large parts of the ground were empty, with Union minister JP Nadda accusing Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi of choosing the anniversary of the 1984 anti-Sikh violence for its show of strength.
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Sunday branded the Opposition INDIA bloc’s rally at Ramlila Maidan a “calculated conspiracy” to push the country into anarchy, and countered it with “padyatras” and press conferences across the country.
Nadda also set out what he called the Congress model of politics. The Congress has not responded to these charges.
Targeting Gandhi, the Union minister said the rally had four objectives: “First, to rub salt into the wounds of our Sikh brothers; second, to orchestrate riots and chaos in Delhi in order to topple a democratically elected government; third, to rob the shopkeepers and traders of Delhi of their earnings during the festive season; and fourth, to bring disrepute to the nation. “The first stage is spreading lies and rumours; the second is inciting anarchy and chaos on the streets; the third is damaging the nation’s economy; and the fourth is attempting to destabilise an elected government at the behest of foreign powers,” he said.
Sambit Patra alleges seats empty at opposition rally
He cast the rally as a coalition of those who lost at the ballot box rather than a movement of the people. The rally was held against the backdrop of the opposition’s campaign against the special intensive revision (SIR) of electoral rolls. The figure and the allegation are his own, and the Congress was not available for comment on them. Patra linked the rally to the SIR debate. “We defeated Congress in Delhi and Haryana. We defeated Akhilesh Yadav in Uttar Pradesh. We defeated RJD in Bihar. Nabin was speaking at one of the padyatras in Rohtak of Haryana.
Meanwhile, the date added to the charged mood as November 1 marks the day in 1984 when anti-Sikh violence spread across Delhi after the assassination of then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi. He said about 5,000 Sikhs were killed and alleged that voter lists were used to mark Sikh homes. Patra said Kumar took charge only in 2025. He said that instead of seeking atonement and offering an apology for the 1984 anti-Sikh riots, the Congress has come out to protest on the anniversary of the killings in Delhi.
The BJP said it urged the Congress to defer the rally by a day or two. BJP MP Sambit Patra said Union home minister Amit Shah raised the issue on both Saturday and Sunday. “This kind of insensitivity only Rahul Gandhi can show,” Patra said at a press conference in New Delhi. “The calculation of the SIR is exactly the same,” he said, arguing that the opposition’s cry of “vote cut” rests on inflated arithmetic. “The day you sit in the chair and fill Form 6, you too will be counted as a voter,” he said. “If the 2024 election was illegal, then are all of your own MPs also illegal?” he asked, and challenged the Congress to show one petition in any court challenging the 2024 result. BJP national president Nitin Nabin framed the rally as the “last resort of repeated electoral losers”. We defeated Trinamool Congress in West Bengal,” he said. In democracy, people’s mandate is supreme, said Nabin.
“Today, all these defeated people want to spread anarchy in the country out of their frustration and despair.
