PANAJI: The BJP-Congress face off over Narendra Modi 's PM candidacy on Wednesday spilled over to the 44th International Film Festival of India (IFFI) being held in Goa.

Information and Broadcasting Minister and Congress spokesperson Manish Tewari while addressing the media on IFFI compared Modi to Adolf Hitler. Tewari drew the parallel while talking about whether the festival was a vehicle of brand India.

Insisting that IFFI was being organized in the spirit of cinema and not as a branding exercise, Tewari said, "A certain individual keeps talking about using the 100 years of Indian cinema as a branding exercise.

We all no what happened when a dictator tried to brand himself through the Berlin Olympics."

It was Modi who had recently said that the government had failed to use the occasion of 100 years of cinema to build its image in front of the world and peddle its soft power. Tewari further attacked Modi over the snooping controversy saying there was no point asking resignation of the Gujarat CM over the issue as he had no morals or a conscience.

Tewari was taking political questions at a press conference in Panaji ahead of the inauguration ceremony of the International Film Festival of India (IFFI). Responding to a question as to whether Modi should resign following the revelations of the controversial tapes, Tewari said: "Resignations should be sought from those who have morals.

If he had any shame, he would have resigned after the 2002 pogrom in Gujarat. This is a shame." The image of Narendra Modi and his aide Amit Shah is under cloud after the tapes released by two investigative websites last week revealed that a woman allegedly had been put under surveillance by the state government. "It is a travesty. Putting people under unauthorised surveillance is a criminal offence which is punishable under our constitution," Tewari said.

When asked why the Congress had picked up the issue when the girl's father did not want it to be followed, Tewari said, "While I have all the respect for the woman's privacy, it is our constitutional duty to take note of and question the wrongs done by the state."