Rahul Gandhi's ‘papa of propaganda’ dig at PM Modi over BJP's 'war rukwa di' ad

Lok Sabha elections: Rahul Gandhi said the truth is coming out after breaking the web of confusion and fear.

Senior Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Tuesday trained guns at the BJP over its recent advertisement that claimed Prime Minister Narendra Modi “stopped a war” and evacuated stranded Indian nationals.

Congress leader Rahul Gandhi reacted to a video widely shared on social media.

The BJP recently released an advertisement in which a woman, playing the role of a student stranded in a foreign country, meets her parents outside an airport and says, “Maine kaha tha na, kaisi bhi situation ho, Modi ji humein ghar le aayenge. War rukwa di papa aur phir humari bus nikaali papa. (I had told you, whatever the situation, Modi ji will bring us home. [He] stopped the war, papa, and then rescued our bus).”

The advertisement was shared on Prime Minister Narendra Modi's official YouTube channel. The description of the YouTube video says, “Under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, all Indians across the globe are safe and secure as they are 'Modi ka Parivar'. Track record of bringing all Indians back safely from war zones and disaster-hit regions a testimony to this.”

Read: ‘PM Modi stopped Ukraine War to evacuate 22,500 Indian students’: Nadda in Udupi

While the advertisement never referred to any particular incident, social media users were quick to find similarities between the BJP's claim that Modi briefly stopped the Russia-Ukraine war to provide safe passage to stranded Indian students.

Rahul Gandhi posted a video of a woman who, surrounded by AAP supporters protesting against Arvind Kejriwal's arrest, mocks the ad and dismisses the claim as propaganda.

Gandhi said, “Now the truth is coming out after breaking the web of confusion and fear.”

“This time the 'Papa of Propaganda' won't be successful, the public itself is ready to show him the mirror,” he added.

Read: PM Modi helped prevent ‘potential nuclear attack’ in Ukraine: Report

Days after Russia declared war in Ukraine, several social media accounts linked to the BJP started hailing the Modi government claiming that Russia stopped the war for India.

However, the ministry of external affairs denied the claim at a regular press briefing. Arindam Bagchi, then MEA spokesperson, said, “We got specific inputs that this is a route that is available... we conveyed that to our citizens, and I am happy that many could make it.”

"Extrapolating that to say that somebody is holding off bombing or this is something we were coordinating is absolutely inaccurate."

Despite MEA's denial, BJP national president Jagat Prakash Nadda reiterated the claim during an election campaign last year in Karnataka.

"No other Prime Minister in the history of India has been as great as Modi ji. He stopped the Russia-Ukraine war to evacuate 22,500 students from there back to India," Nadda said at a rally in Udupi.