New Delh: Barely a day after rumours did the rounds about his quitting the BJP, Shehzad Poonawalla, on Saturday, made a sarcastic comment aimed at Congress MP Rahul Gandhi and others for calling Prime Minister Narendra Modi a dictator.
“Friends, I am totally disappointed with PM Narendra Modi,” Poonawalla said, because “he is unable to be a proper dictator”.
He was apparently trying to make the point that PM Modi is not dictatorial but actually forgiving,
“It’s been 12 years and he is a failure. He doesn’t know how to be a dictator properly. Instead of being a dictator, he released a video last night and, to the kids who have abused him, constitutional authorities, his mother, he says these are just ‘mischievous’ kids and forgives them,” Poonawalla said in the video on Instagram.
He was referring to the July 31 video by the PM in which he said he was “forgiving” those who had used profanities against him in the recent GenZ-heavy protests led by the Cockroach Janta Party (CJP) that had also pushed Dharmendra Pradhan to resign as Union education minister, as reported by Hindustan Times.
The charismatic figure, who has been the national spokesperson of the BJP, updated his bio recently, dropping any mention of the party. Poonawalla, however, maintained that he was a Modi supporter for life.
In his latest video, he contested the PM’s “forgiving” behaviour with that of the Nehru-Gandhi family.
“Rahul Gandhi is a descendant of Indira Gandhi, of (Jawaharlal) Nehru. Learn from him what’s real dictatorship, what’s real Emergency,” Poonawalla said, adding: “Look at their history!”
He also mentioned the Anna Hazare movement of 2011-12 and cited recent cases filed in Congress-ruled Kerala and Telangana over Instagram posts and student protests.
“These Left liberals, all their hopes, you have ruined them,” Poonawalla, who has been with the Congress in the past, further said.
“You are unable to be a dictator. You have failed,” he said, referring to PM Modi yet again.
Union minister J P Nadda had recently defended police action against CJP members and supporters during the Parliament march of July 20 in the Rajya Sabha.
He had told the House how he had been arrested from his classroom multiple times during the Emergency. He called such arrests “a very normal situation” for any student activist.
Poonawalla, on Friday, had criticised a skit performed by members of the Opposition in Parliament against the theft of donations from the Ram Janmabhoomi Temple.
He had called the skit anti-Hindu and dared Rahul and the others to put up similar performances against similar incidents taking place at religious institutions of other communities.