Stop blaming SIR: Amit Shah attacks Rahul Gandhi, says Congress will lose in 2029

Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Tuesday accused Congress MP Rahul Gandhi of blaming the SIR exercise for his party’s defeats in past elections and predicted that the Congress would suffer a fourth consecutive loss in the 2029 Lok Sabha elections.“You can no longer gain the trust of the people by fabricating media events and ‘Jhooth Ki Goonj’,” Amit Shah said, taking a swipe at Rahul Gandhi’s ‘Chhatron Ki Goonj’ outreach and his allegations over the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls.Amit Shah said the Congress needed to introspect instead of “questioning electoral processes” after repeated defeats. He also accused Rahul Gandhi of being disconnected from voters, arguing that protests and allegations would not help the party regain public support.“I want to tell Rahul Gandhi and his colleagues to once again prepare for a crushing defeat in the 2029 general elections. The NDA is poised to win with a landslide majority, and the Congress is set to lose for the fourth consecutive time,” he said. SHAH CITES BJP'S GUJARAT VICTORYAmit Shah’s remarks came after the BJP won 90 of 104 seats across three urban local bodies in Gujarat – the Gandhinagar Municipal Corporation and the municipalities of Okha and Thara.In Gandhinagar, the BJP secured 38 of 44 seats, while the Congress won five and an independent candidate took one. The Aam Aadmi Party failed to win any of the 32 seats it contested in the corporation. Amit Shah, who is the Gandhinagar MP, claimed the BJP had increased its vote share in Gandhinagar by 10 percentage points compared with the previous election, describing the results as a reflection of continued support for Prime Minister Narendra Modi. He also said the Congress had not won an election in Gujarat since 1985.Citing the recent bypolls in Assam, West Bengal, Tamil Nadu and Puducherry, along with local body elections in Rajasthan and Tripura, Amit Shah argued that the Congress’s electoral setbacks could not be attributed solely to allegations concerning voter lists or EVMs.He pointed to the use of ballot papers in Tripura’s local polls, saying the BJP’s performance there countered claims that its victories depended on EVMs.'CONGRESS HAS NO REACH IN VILLAGES'Amit Shah said Rahul Gandhi could not claim to represent the country by mobilising Opposition leaders and supporters for protests in Delhi. “The nation's voice is in the fields, barns, villages, remote hills, forests, and even on the banks of rivers. You have no reach there,” he said.He accused the Congress of failing to connect with voters and alleged that Rahul Gandhi was trying to protect infiltrators amid a huge debate over the SIR.Amit Shah thanked voters across states, including Gujarat, for backing the BJP and its allies, maintaining that the results reflected continued public confidence in the party and the NDA.- Ends