india

Updated: May 03, 2019 22:06 IST

Finance minister Arun Jaitley on Friday hit out at Congress president Rahul Gandhi, saying his attempt at “revenge” against Prime Minister Narendra Modi may not succeed, and will end up as revenge against his own party.

He wondered how the Congress president could damage the image of PM Modi who, he said, was at the peak of his popularity.

Jaitley was referring to Gandhi’s statement, cited by a media organisation, in which he said, “I have dismantled Modi’s image... I will damage his image.”

“Can image be destroyed by a person who belongs to a family which has been tainted through generations with charges of corruption?” Jaitley asked, adding, “He does not gauge public opinion. He only talks, does not listen.” “His revenge against Prime Minister Modi may not succeed. It may well turn out to be revenge against the Congress,” the senior Bharatiya Janata Party leader wrote.

Jaitley claimed it was clear that Gandhil concocted falsehoods, as in the allegations he has made about irregularities in the Rafale jet fighter deal, started believing his own falsehoods and eventually dreamt that they had destroyed his opponent.

Jaitley called Gandhi a dynast who bought his own propaganda even if there were not too many others willing to accept it. He said dynasts had a sense of entitlement and they believed that they were born to rule. The Gandhis, he said, suffered from this sense of entitlement.

“Dynasts have self-illusory opinion about themselves... They tend to become megalomaniacs,” Jaitley said. “Rahul Gandhi is no exception.” He said Gandhi also had a “disproportionate impression” about his oratorical skills when he challenged Modi, whom he called “one of the greatest communicators of his times”, to debates.