# Kharge jabs Shah: ‘When I became MLA, he was a child’ 2026-08-18T08:13:09+00:00 | Governance | Indian Opinion Desk Corroboration: 1 independent outlet Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge took a swipe at Union Home Minister Amit Shah, saying Shah was a child when Kharge first became an MLA. The remark came in response to Shah's allegation that during the Independence Day event at the Congress headquarters, Sonia Gandhi ordered the song Vande Mataram to be stopped midway. Kharge, a former chief minister of Karnataka, made the comment at a press conference on Wednesday. He said Shah, who is 61, should not make irresponsible statements about the national song. "When I first became an MLA, Amit Shah was a child. He should have some respect for elders," Kharge said. The BJP hit back, accusing Kharge of showing arrogance. Party spokesperson Sambit Patra said the Congress president's remarks reflected the party's "anti-national" mindset. The exchange comes amid a bitter war of words between the two parties ahead of assembly elections in several states. ## Coverage - ndtv.com This story was synthesised by AI from the source linked above. Tags: Amit Shah, BJP, Congress, Mallikarjun Kharge, Sonia Gandhi Canonical: https://indianopinion.org/kharge-jabs-shah-when-i-became-mla-he-was-a-child/ License: Summary and commentary (c) Indian Opinion, reusable with attribution. Facts belong to the linked sources. Cite: https://indianopinion.org/kharge-jabs-shah-when-i-became-mla-he-was-a-child/#story-in-brief Review state: restored archive article, accurate at time of publication, not offered to search indexes. How this brief was made: an AI model read the report linked above and wrote this summary and analysis, which were published automatically. Published briefs are sampled every hour by an automated quality check; the editor verifies its findings and approves corrections, and corrected briefs carry a dated correction line. We do no original reporting. Methodology: https://indianopinion.org/ai-use-policy/