Attack on Rahul Gandhi's convoy; BJP youth leader arrested in Gujarat

The action comes after 18 hours of night-long dharna and demonstration by Congress leaders and scores of district level supporters.

Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi arrives to visit the flood affected areas of Runi village in Banaskantha district on Friday. | PTI

MUMBAI: A local BJP youth wing activist, Jayesh Darji, was arrested while two other BJP workers from Dhanera of Banaskantha district were interrogated on Saturday for pelting stones at Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi’s vehicles on Friday during his tour of the flood-affected area of the state.

“We have arrested one person named Jayesh Darji alias Anil Rathod for allegedly throwing a stone at the vehicle in which Gandhi was travelling,” Banaskantha superintendent of police Niraj Badgujar has said.

“We arrested Darji after his name was given by Congress members during the course of investigation,” he added.

The Congress, meanwhile, has blamed the BJP and its ideological fountainhead the RSS for the attack, with Rahul himself taking potshots at the PM for not condemning the attack.

“It is obvious that those who attack others won’t condemn such an act,” Rahul said without naming Modi. “The BJP workers hurled a huge stone at my car. My personal security officer was injured. This is the way of Modi and BJP’s politics. What can one say about it,” he said.

“The incident in Gujarat can’t be ignored. There are floods at various places across the country and Rahul Gandhi is trying to reach out to people affected by floods. At Dhanera, where local chief minister had reached after three days of the floods, Rahul Gandhi was addressing a gathering of 3,000. The government tried all ways to disrupt the meeting but Gandhi was undisturbed,” said party leader Ghulam Nabi Azad.
He also accused the central and the state government of failing in providing adequate security to the party vice president.

Stone was hurled at Gandhi’s car from a hostile crowd who had earlier waived black flags while Gandhi addressed a small meeting of flood affected people. The people who waved black flags at him also booed him out by chanting Modi-Modi slogans.

Several state Congress leaders had held protest demonstrations at the local police station demanding action against the attackers. Some of them went on a night-long dharna condemning the incident and demanding immediate arrest of the perpetrators.