'Gadkari used Sudarshan as proxy to attack Sonia'

Worried about his name being dragged into Mumbai's Adarsh society scam, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) president Nitin Gadkari has used former Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) chief K S Sudarshan as a proxy to make distasteful allegations against Sonia Gandhi, a Congress MP said in Panaji on Friday.

Worried about his name being dragged into Mumbai's Adarsh society scam, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) president Nitin Gadkari has used former Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) chief K S Sudarshan as a proxy to make distasteful allegations against Sonia Gandhi, a Congress MP said in Panaji on Friday.

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Goa's lone Rajya Sabha member Shantaram Naik, in a press statement here, said Gadkari himself had used harsh language against the Congress president. Therefore, it was likely that he engaged the services of Sudarshan for using harsher language against her, which he himself could not as BJP president, Naik added.

"There is a nexus between the charges made by the Congress against BJP president Nitin Gadkari's benami ownership of a flat in Adarsh Society in Mumbai and Sudarshan's statement against Sonia Gandhi," Naik said.

"It is well known that Gadkari is the RSS nominee in the BJP or rather he is on deputation from RSS to the BJP...," the All India Congress Committee (AICC) secretary added.

Sudarshan allegedly made the derogatory remarks against Sonia Gandhi at a rally in Bhopal Thursday -- in what the Congress termed as "uncivilised language".

Both the RSS and the BJP later distanced themselves from Sudarshan's statements.