BJP demands Congress apology over Sonia Gandhi Vande Mataram row

West Bengal chief minister Suvendu Adhikari and Union home minister Amit Shah led BJP attacks on Congress chairperson Sonia Gandhi on Sunday after a video from the Congress headquarters on August 15 showed her appearing to speak while Vande Mataram was being sung. Adhikari said the entire state of Bengal was 'fuming' and demanded an apology, accusing the Congress of appeasement politics. Shah, speaking in Chittorgarh, said Gandhi had asked for the song to be stopped and demanded she apologise to the people and to Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay.

The Congress has denied the allegations, saying Gandhi was only asking for a chair for party president Mallikarjun Kharge, who had been standing. BJP leaders in Mangaluru filed a police complaint at Urwa station seeking an FIR against Gandhi. BJP spokesperson Pradeep Bhandari played an audio clip he claimed showed Rahul Gandhi saying the party did not need to sing Vande Mataram, and gave the Congress 24 hours to apologise. Sumitro Chatterjee, a descendant of Chattopadhyay and a BJP MLA, also wrote to Gandhi expressing pain over the incident.

The row is the latest flashpoint between the BJP and Congress over symbols of patriotism. The BJP noted that for the first time, the full six-stanza version of Vande Mataram was sung at the Red Fort complex on Independence Day. Police have taken the complaint in Mangaluru but no formal action has been announced yet.