NEW DELHI: Amid protests escalating across Arab countries over the controversy surrounding the anti-Islam remarks made by its now-suspended spokesperson Nupur Sharma and expelled member Naveen Kumar Jindal, BJP was at the receiving end of the opposition's sharp criticism on Monday, with Congress accusing the Narendra Modi-led BJP government of weakening India globally and domestically by promoting bigotry and AAP alleging that it was because of BJP's "hate-riddled" politics that Indian diplomats "were being insulted in foreign countries and ambassadors were being summoned by foreign governments to issue apologies".
The TRS too hit out saying the ruling BJP at the Centre should be apologising and not the government since the aberration has come from the party's platform.
While Congress leader Rahul Gandhi tweeted, "Divided internally, India becomes weak externally. BJP's shameful bigotry has not only isolated us, but also damaged India's standing globally", party spokesperson Randeep Surjewala said BJP is pushing the country into the dark age of communal polarisation to serve its narrow political interests, and asked why have the guilty spokespersons not been arrested.
Senior Congress leader Jairam Ramesh, meanwhile, introduced a twist in the controversy by arguing that India was paying for what he termed the foreign ministry's impudent "votebank politics" riposte to the negative US report on religious minorities in India last week. He sought to link the growing protests from Islamic nations to the MEA's aggressive response to the US, underlining that the countries are all old American allies.