By IANS
New Delhi : The Congress party, which has done several u-turns on party president Sonia Gandhi’s ‘merchants of death’ remark, Tuesday said it had given “detailed reasons” to the poll panel, clarifying that she had not violated the poll code during her Gujarat election campaign speech.
“We have filed an appropriate and detailed response,” party spokesperson Abishek Manu Singhvi told reporters here. Singhvi, who was authorised to respond to the Election Commission notice on behalf of the Congress chief, however, declined to give details of the reply.
“All I can assure you is that detailed reasons have been given to demonstrate that there is absolutely no question of violation of the model code of conduct,” he said.
According to sources, the Congress has argued that Gandhi was not specifically referring to Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi in her remark.
“If you see the Hindi version of the speech, Gandhi has said ‘merchants of death’. She was referring to the state functionaries and Modi is included in it as he is the administrative head there,” said a Congress leader, who did not want to be identified.
The Election Commission had issued notice to Gandhi for the remark made at an election rally in Gujarat’s Navsari town Dec 1.
In its response, the Congress has apparently clarified that Gandhi’s remark was not meant to undermine anyone or settle political scores with any individual.
Senior Congress leader Digvijay Singh, who too was served a notice by the poll panel for his reported remark on “Hindu terrorism” in Gujarat, has also replied to the notice.
He denied newspaper reports that quoted his controversial remarks, and asked the commission to call the complainant to furnish more concrete material rather than make baseless complaints on hearsay.
“I may also clarify that if the entire speech, which is a subject matter of notice, is considered dispassionately by the commission, it will be crystal clear that I have not referred to or criticised any of the aspects of private life of any BJP leader nor have I criticised or made allegations on unverified and distorted facts,” he said in his two-page response.
Congress leaders have done several u-turns on Gandhi’s controversial remark.
On Friday, Science and Technology Minister Kapil Sibal said the remarks were not aimed at Modi, but only at state functionaries. But on Saturday, Singhvi asserted that it was meant only for Modi.
However, Singhvi later retracted his earlier position and agreed with Sibal.
On Monday, party spokesperson Shakeel Ahmed also claimed that the party president was referring to “the political failure of the Gujarat administration”.