BJP stands firm on Congress-Soros links, rejects calls for apology | India News
NEW DELHI: Political confrontation on BJP’s allegation about Congress’s links with US-based currency manipulator and hedge fund operator George Soros looks unlikely to abate soon with the party in power rejecting the demand for an apology.
“I stand by what I said because I spoke on the basis of facts they have not been able to dispute. In fact, I could not get to ask all the 10 questions I had planned to and will exercise my right to defend myself under Rule 357 to produce my entire chargesheet, should they insist on apology,” said Nishikant Dubey, BJP member who levelled the charge in Lok Sabha on Thursday and doubled it down on Friday to rile the opposition party further with his “Congress ka haath, Soros ke Saath” jibe.
Citing the claims made by French media outlet Mediapart, BJP, in both Houses, said on Thursday that Soros, through his proxies like the Open Society Foundation, Human Rights Watch, and Organised Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP), has consistently timed his “false propaganda” to coincide with Parliament sessions in India, which were then used by Congress leaders, with Rahul Gandhi taking the lead.
Importantly, despite US embassy’s protests against the saffron party’s attempt to establish a link between the investigative journalism project and the State Department, BJP stuck to its charge that OCCRP was a project of the US department. “It is a matter of fact. It is for them to figure out whether those behind the false propaganda against India exceeded their brief as part of a deep state operation,” said Dubey as he made light of US embassy’s complaint against BJP’s statement.
BJP’s charge is based on Mediapart’s claims that OCCRP derived a substantial part of its funding from the US and other western countries like the UK, France, Switzerland and Sweden. US’s share alone stood at 53%, though OCCRP’s Drew Sullian puts it at 46%. More importantly, it was created by US Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement. In fact, it owes its creation to David Hodkinson, formerly of US army who was deployed in 25 countries. A reservist now, he works for the US Director of National Intelligence as a colonel (retd).
Mediapart, relying on the statements of Sullivan, summed up OCCRP’s position vis-a-vis the US govt as of “structural dependency”, since it is constrained from doing stories on US matters because of “conflict of interest” and because it is governed by the US Foreign Services Act that its activities is “aligned with and advance US foreign policy of economic sanctions”. In an 2023 email to the OCCRP staff, Sullvan explained that the group will not do stories on the US because all of its budget was paid for by Washington and the Open Society Foundation of Soros.
BJP’s annoyance with Soros, who has made no secret of his dislike for Prime Minister Narendra Modi and has included him in the list of targets, which also include US President-elect Donald Trump, is not new. It has also accused him of working in league with Congress.
But it is Mediapart’s disclosure about OCCRP, whose claims regarding Pegasus spyware, efficacy of anti-Covid vaccines developed in India, and currency manipulation by Adani Group, were seized upon by Congress and others to disrupt proceedings of Parliament, being backed by a US govt agency and Soros, appears to have encouraged the saffron strategists to turn their grievance into a full-scale campaign.
Beginning Thursday, there has been a flood of posts on X, where party officials and supporters shared snippets of information, claiming that Congress, through its leaders like Rahul Gandhi, was in cahoots with Soros to push an agenda to undermine and defame the Modi government.
