The issue of the alleged abuse hurled at Prime Minister Narendra Modi during Rahul Gandhi's 'Voter Adhikar Yatra' in Bihar spilled out on the streets on Friday when Bharatiya Janata Party workers stormed the Congress headquarters in Patna and Kolkata, prompting the Leader of the Opposition in Lok Sabha to declare 'truth always triumphs'.
Patna
While the person who had allegedly screamed expletives into the mic at Darbhanga two days ago was arrested, BJP workers in the state capital staged a march to Sadaqat Ashram, the Bihar Pradesh Congress Committee (BPCC) headquarters, and clashed with their counterparts in the opposition party.
"We will not tolerate the insult to Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Rahul Gandhi, his party and alliance partners will have to apologise," said state minister Nitin Nabin, who had led the procession from the BJP office, situated a couple of kilometres from Sadaqat Ashram.
Gandhi, who was in Gopalganj, about 120 km away, and is likely to be in Patna on Monday when the yatra will conclude, came out with an X post in Hindi, indirectly referring to the clash.
'Violence and falsehood stand no chance before truth and non-violence. Indulge in assault and vandalism to your heart's content. We will continue our fight to protect truth and the Constitution. Truth always triumphs! (Satyamev Jayate),' wrote Gandhi.
Congress general secretary Sachin Pilot, who is accompanying Gandhi, was more blunt.
"Whoever used abusive language deserves condemnation. But it is wrong to associate the Congress and the INDIA bloc with the episode. And the attack on our party's state headquarters was abominable. We hope the Bihar government takes appropriate action against the accused. It is clear that the BJP is rattled by the success of 'Voter Adhikar Yatra'," Pilot said.
Addressing the same press conference, Rashtriya Janata Dal national spokesperson Manoj Jha said, "We took no time in condemning the incident. But has the BJP ever apologised for many foul remarks made, over the years, by its top leaders, including the Prime Minister himself? They are the followers of Nathuram Godse who assassinated Mahatma Gandhi."
WATCH: Congress, BJP workers clash in Patna
"Today, they could not have fired bullets, so they wielded sticks," Jha said and claiming that it was an attempt by the saffron party to make headlines.
The BJP, which rules the Centre, may get so-called mood of the nation surveys published in its favour, but it knows that if elections are held today, Prime Minister Narendra Modi will be left looking for options for himself, he claimed.
Congress general secretary (organisation) K C Venugopal wrote on X, 'Baffled by the soaring popularity of the Voter Adhikar Yatra, the BJP has once again unleashed its hooligans to intimidate and scare us. The attack on our Bihar PCC office Sadaqat Ashram in Patna, led by a cabinet minister and other BJP leaders, is an act of cowardice.'
Bihar Police must take strict and exemplary action against perpetrators of this crime, he said.
Patna Central Superintendent of Police Diksha said, "Injuries have been sustained by people from both sides. The situation has been brought under control. Further action may be taken after investigation."
Hours after the clash, senior BJP leader and local MP Ravi Shankar Prasad alleged at a press conference, "Our workers were staging a democratic protest when goons of the Congress attacked them with rods and sticks."
"Neither Rahul Gandhi, nor Sonia Gandhi nor Tejashwi Yadav has apologised for the deplorable language used for the PM's late mother. We have been keeping track and, so far, Congress leaders have hurled abuses at Modi more than 100 times. And whenever they do so, their political graph drops further," Prasad said.
Notably, abusive language was used in Jale assembly segment of Darbhanga on Wednesday when Gandhi, his sister and Congress general secretary Priyanka Vadra and RJD leader Tejashwi Yadav had passed through the district on motorcycles.
On Thursday, local Congress leader Mohd Naushad, who has been named in a case lodged at Simri police station by Darbhanga BJP president Adityan Narayan Manna, admitted that the video was of a podium he had got erected, but claimed that profane language was used by people not known to him in his absence.
On Friday, Darbhanga Police identified the culprit as Mohd Rizvi alias Raja, a 20-year-old resident of Singhwara, and arrested him.
Meanwhile, senior Congress leader Pawan Khera, who heads the party's media and publicity department, claimed that he suspected the BJP toolkit at work.
"We would like to know who had instigated the person to indulge in such behaviour. It is obvious that we would not do anything that would take the focus away from yatra. The BJP toolkit works by planting such elements in gatherings of opposition parties so that its leaders can later on raise a huge and cry," Khera claimed.
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Kolkata
Ripples of BJP-Congress clashes were also felt in Kolkata on Friday after a group of BJP supporters vandalised the grand old party's West Bengal state headquarters during a protest.
The agitators, allegedly led by local BJP leader Rakesh Singh, a Congress turncoat, ransacked festoons at the Bidhan Bhavan on CIT Road in central Kolkata, burnt party flags and smeared portraits of Rahul Gandhi with black paint.
The protesters even burnt tyres before the main gate of the party office and proclaimed that Congress would face 'more such repercussions across India if it did not stop badmouthing BJP leaders'.
The Congress party's state unit president Subhankar Sarkar demanded an explanation from his BJP counterpart Samik Bhattacharya for the 'dastardly attack' and called the saffron party 'uncivilised and barbaric'.
Later in the day, Sarkar led a protest rally of the party from its headquarters and blocked the city's arterial Moulali Crossing, bringing rush hour traffic to its knees in and around Kolkata for about 30 minutes.
"This is a black day in West Bengal's politics," Sarkar said, adding, "Politics used to be fought on the streets on the basis of ideologies but never have party offices directly come under attack like this."
Eyewitness accounts stated that a bunch of people carrying BJP flags gathered in front of the Pradesh Congress office in the morning and raised slogans against Rahul Gandhi, while setting fire to Congress party flags.
The photographs of Gandhi in some festoons put up by the Congress outside the office were also blackened by the protesters.
In a video posted by Singh on his Facebook timeline in justification of the violence, the politician stated, "Let this serve as a warning to all Congress leaders and workers across the country that you will have to remain prepared for such repercussions if you continue to abuse our leaders."
In the purported video clip, Singh is then seen smearing the portrait of Rahul Gandhi with black paint on a Congress hoarding put up outside the party office.
Protesters were then seen entering the office premises and destroying several other party banners and setting them on fire.
"This was only a minor trailer of what is going to happen across the country from here on. The Congress will sink beneath the ground if protests like these get repeated elsewhere," Singh later told PTI Videos.
Immediately after the incident, the state Congress chief wrote an open letter to Bhattacharya, seeking action against Singh.
'We do not know how far the anger of Congress workers will go if action is not taken against Rakesh Singh by the BJP and the police,' Sarkar wrote in the letter.
Congress leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury, while addressing reporters at Baharampur in Murshidabad district, said the party will resist such attacks, and threatened to raid the BJP's state headquarters if corrective measures weren't taken by the saffron party.
"We will not tolerate such hooliganism at the Congress office. Has Rahul Gandhi badmouthed anyone? Unable to answer his criticisms and stand before them, the BJP is distorting his comments and indulging in violence.
"They are trying to provoke voters in Bihar without trying to know what Rahul Gandhi has actually said," Chowdhury said.
"I will ask Congress workers to tighten security around the Pradesh Congress office and continue protests in Kolkata till the BJP goon, responsible for this attack, is arrested. The Congress will not accept such attacks on its address which represents the party's politics, struggles and identity in Bengal. We, too, can raid BJP's office. Such one-sided attacks cannot be allowed to persist in the state," he added.
The Trinamool Congress, interestingly, while criticising the violence also took a potshot at the Congress for allegedly trying to pave way for the saffron camp in West Bengal in the past.
"I severely condemn the attack on Congress state head office by the BJP. The Congress leaders should realise that no TMC worker has ever dared to do such a thing in the last 14 years.
"This is the Tripura culture which the BJP is trying to implement here even while being in opposition and is the same party whose path the Congress tried to pave in 2021 by tying up with (ISF founder) Abbas Siddiqui to eat into our votes. Can you imagine what extent this party can go to if it came to power?" said TMC social media chief Debangshu Bhattacharya.
"In your bid to burn the houses of others, are you not igniting your own?" he asked.