Amit Shah Takes On Rahul Gandhi On Notes Ban Tweet

BJP chief Amit Shah today took on Rahul Gandhi, who tweeted a picture of an anguished ex-serviceman to pan demonetisation, saying people will no longer be misled by such falsity and cited the former soldier's remarks to media supporting the note ban decision.

The top leaders of the Congress and the BJP battled it out on social media platform Twitter on the first anniversary of demonetisation with Mr Gandhi firing the first shot.

The Congress vice president posted a couplet and tagged a last year's viral picture of Nand Lal, the septuagenarian former army soldier, which showed him in tears as he waited for his turn to withdraw currency notes following the demonetisation decision.

Seeking to embarrass Mr Gandhi, Mr Shah tagged a fresh interview of Nand Lal who, the report said, has come out in support of the note ban decision.

Attacking the Congress, the BJP chief said it has always grabbed power with false portrayal of the poor but it was no longer possible to dupe the country with "false tears and false pictures".

"The real face of the Congress has been unmasked and a new India has emerged," the BJP chief tweeted in Hindi with his own poetic barb at Mr Gandhi.

On the first anniversary of the demonetisation decision, both the BJP and the Congress today held nation-wide events with the ruling party celebrating it as an "anti-blackmoney day" while the opposition calling it a "black day".

Targeting Mr Gandhi, Union minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said he is turning Indian National Congress into "Indian Fake News Congress".

He said it was "unfair" on Mr Gandhi's part to use the photo of a former soldier for his "nefarious design" and cited Lal's remarks made in an interview favouring the note ban decision.

"Some fake photograph of his has been used by Rahul Gandhi to criticise (demonetisation). Nand Lal has been a distinguished soldier of the Army. He has retired. He has publicly supported Narendra Modi and demonetisation. It is completely unfair," the BJP leader said.

"This is the level of Rahul Gandhi. He is determined to make Indian National Congress the Indian Fake News Congress.

At least, he must stop insulting soldiers for his nefarious design," he said.

Mr Prasad alleged that it was not the first time that the the Congress had tried to mislead the people. The party highlighted the pain of a "poor man" in a queue in Karnataka and that person turned out to be a rich Congress leader whose premises were raided by government agencies later, the minister claimed.

The BJP and the Congress have been sparring over the note ban issue.

Former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had yesterday termed demonetisation as "organised loot" and "legalised plunder".

Hitting back, Prasad had said the former prime minister "seemed to be reading scripts written by someone else, just like Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi".