Porni Banerjee | ১০ মে ২০২৪ ১৬ : ৫৫

A police case was registered against BJP MP Navneet Rana after she stoked controversy over her ‘voting for Congress means voting for Pakistan’ remark amid intense election campaigns. The case was filed in Hyderabad, under section 188 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC).

Rana, while addressing a crowd recently during an election campaign in Telangana’s Shadnagar, urged people not to vote for Congress and said, “If you vote for Congress, that vote goes directly to Pakistan.”

On Thursday, Rana made a sharp attack against AIMIM president Asaduddin Owaisi and his brother Akbaruddin saying that, “If the police were removed from duty for 15 seconds, the brothers would not know from where they came and where they went.” Her statement drew criticism from Telangana Chief Minister A Revanth Reddy and Asaduddin.

Following the controversial statement, the state’s chief minister asked the election commission officials to book a criminal case and arrest the “Parliament member who made provocative comments.”

Rana’s blistering attack came in response to a 2013 controversial speech by AIMIM MLA Akbaruddin Owaisi in which he said it would take them only “15 minutes” to balance the “Hindu-Muslim ratio” in the country if the police were removed.

During her Hyderabad campaign, Rana also said that votes to even AIMIM apart from Congress indicates votes “directly to Pakistan”.

“The kind of ‘AIMIM prem (love)’ and ‘Rahul prem’ Pakistan is showing... Just like Congress that governed country on signals from Pak... the same Pak is today saying they ‘love Congress and AIMIM’,” Rana said, further noting that Madhavi Latha (Rana’s party colleague) will “definitely stop Hyderabad from turning into Pakistan.”