Public broadcaster All India Radio (AIR) kicked-up a row on Thursday after it mocked Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi for withdrawing his plea in the Supreme Court seeking to quash the defamation case filed against him for holding the RSS responsible for the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi.
“Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi tells the Supreme Court that he will face trial in RSS defamation case. Why he got scared earlier? How he became daring again to defame #RSS?" the official handle of AIR tweeted with the hashtag #RahulRattlesRSS.
The tweet, however, was later deleted on the instructions of Sitanshu Kar , the director general of news at AIR.
“The said tweet has been deleted on the direction of DG News as it did not conform to editorial standards of AIR,” another tweet from AIR said.
Outraged over the AIR tweets, the Congress party asked Information and Broadcasting Minister to explain whether the public broadcaster was being allowed to propagate the saffron agenda.
"All India Radio hurriedly deleted the outrageous tweet but caught red-handed sponsoring saffron propaganda. Unprecedented, unheard of that official broadcaster should attack Mr Rahul Gandhi! Shameful & unpardonable,” tweeted Congress spokesperson Randeep Surjewala.
"Does Information & Broadcasting Minister @MVenkaiahNaidu take orders from the RSS for tweets from AIR? So now All India Radio has officially become His Masters' Voice? So rattled by #RahulRattlesRSS???" he said in another tweet.
Earlier in the day, Congress vice-president told the Supreme Court the he stood by every word he had said about the RSS with regard to its association with people who assassinated Mahatma Gandhi and that he was ready to face the defamation case filed against him by a Sangh functionary in a Maharashtra court.
Rahul also withdrew the appeal filed by him against the Bombay High Court verdict refusing to quash the defamation case.
He also withdrew his appeal against the summons issued to him by a Bhiwandi trial court in a similar case.
