CHANDIGARH: With Kamal Nath among the frontrunners for the chief minister's post in Madhya Pradesh, Arvind Kejriwal's AAP said Rahul Gandhi's party was rubbing salt into the wounds of 1984 anti-Sikh riot victims.
AAP alleged that Kamal Nath's name figured prominently for leading groups to attack Sikhs in 1984 following the assassination of Indira Gandhi.
Congress has rubbed salt into the wounds of anti-Sikh riot victims instead of providing justice, Punjab AAP lawmaker and Leader of Opposition in the state assembly Harpal Singh Cheema said.
He asked Gandhi to not make Nath the chief minister, saying it has caused a widespread resentment among Sikhs. Cheema also demanded the Centre to initiate a time-bound inquiry against Nath for his alleged role in the riot.
He reminded Congress that how the party had to rollback the decision of appointing Nath as in-charge of its Punjab unit in 2016.
However, Punjab minister Vijay Inder Singla hit out at the opposition, saying they should leave the decision on who will be Madhya Pradesh's chief minister to the Congress.
"They are no authority to tell our party high-command what it should do," Singla told reporters when asked to comment on Shiromani Akali Dal's Manjinder Singh Sirsa accusing the Congress leadership of "protecting the perpetrators" of the riot.
Singla said rather the SAD leadership should tell people of Punjab for what "mistakes" they have sought atonement for.
The SAD leadership, led by party patron Parkash Singh Badal, had offered prayers at Akal Takht last week, the supreme temporal body of Sikhs, to seek atonement for the "mistakes" it committed "inadvertently" in the past.