"They are even worse than BJP": Ghulam Nabi Azad rips into Congress, NC over thier Udhampur-Doda choice

Congress has named the controversial Choudhary Lal Singh, who had publicly supported the accused in the 2018 gang rape and murder of a minor Bakerwal girl in Kathua, from Udhampur-Doda in the Lok Sabha elections.

Azad, the former leader of Congress, also took on the National Conference vice president Omar Abdullah and said, "They call the BJP communal, but it threw Lal Singh out of the party, but it was Congress who welcomed him into its party."

Addressing a gathering on Wednesday, he said, "They are even worse than BJP. Rahul Gandhi once said that to make the arrest until we won't leave; Omar Abdullah stated that unless he goes to jail, we cannot breathe; what happened to jail? Today they are walking in the streets madly."

Lal Singh, who participated in a rally in support of the accused in the Kathua gangrape case in 2018, rejoined the Congress after a 10-year stint away from the Congress, which had fielded him from Udhampur-Doda.

Singh was a cabinet minister in the BJP-PDP alliance in the erstwhile state when he, along with his party colleague Chander Prakash Ganga, were forced to resign over their participation in a rally organised to support those arrested in connection with the Kathua rape and murder case in 2018.

After leaving the BJP in 2019, Singh launched his own outfit, DSSP, and contested the 2019 Lok Sabha polls from Udhampur, but was defeated by BJP's Jitendra Singh.

The same goes for the National Conference (NC), whose leader Omar Abdullah only last year opposed Lal Singh's bid to join Rahul Gandhi's Bharat Jodo Yatra in its J&K leg, warning the Congress that some people might try to use the Yatra to "whitewash their past".

"We have not forgotten the role played by those leaders who tried to save the (Kathua) rapists,'' Omar had then told reporters. (ANI)