EC gives Rahul Gandhi clean chit over calling Amit Shah 'murder accused'

NEW DELHI: The Election Commission has held that Congress president Rahul Gandhi did not violate the model code of conduct during an election speech in Madhya Pradesh where he called his BJP counterpart Amit Shah a "murder-accused".

Giving a clean chit to Gandhi, EC officials said that "The complaint was examined in detail and after examination of the complete transcript of speech sent by the district electoral officer of Jabalpur, the Commission is of the considered view that no violation of the model code of conduct is made out." Gandhi made the purported remark during an election rally in Sihora district of Madhya Pradesh on April 23.

Attacking the BJP president, Gandhi reportedly said, "Murder accused BJP chief Amit Shah. Wah, kya shaan hai! (Wow, what a glory!)" The BJP had complained to the EC about the comment.

The remark had prompted a strong rebuttal from Shah, who questioned the opposition leader's "legal knowledge" and said the "fake" charge was dismissed as "politically motivated" by the court long ago.

"Let me tell you the gist of the order. I was slapped with a fake case and the court has already passed its order that it was a politically motivated allegation and was without any evidence. I don't want to make any comment on the legal knowledge of Rahul Gandhi," he said.

In 2014, a special court discharged Shah in the Sohrabuddin Sheikh and Tulsiram Prajapati encounter killing cases, holding there existed "no case" against him and that he had been implicated for "political reasons".