New Delhi:

He was responding to a question from a Sikh student during an interactive session at the Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs at the Brown University in the United States of America on April 21. The video of the interaction was uploaded on the YouTube channel of the Institute on Saturday.

The Sikh student had also referred to Rahul’s remark during his earlier US visit where he had said that he was fighting a battle on whether Sikhs would be allowed to wear a turban in India or not.

In his reply, the Congress leader said, "I don't think that anything scares the Sikhs. The statement I made was that, do we want an India where people are uncomfortable to express their religion? As far as mistakes of the Congress party are concerned, a lot of those mistakes happened when I was not there, but I am more than happy to take responsibility for everything that the Congress party has ever done wrong in its history."

The Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha went on to add, "I have publicly stated that what happened in the 80s was wrong, I have been to the Golden Temple multiple times, I have an extremely good relationship with the Sikh community in India and a loving relationship with them."

Tagging this segment of the interaction, Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) IT Department head Amit Malviya said on Saturday, "'You haven't reconciled with the Sikhs. A young man tells Rahul Gandhi to his face, reminding him of the unfounded fear-mongering he engaged in during his last visit to the US."

"It is quite unprecedented that Rahul Gandhi is now being ridiculed not just in India, but around the world," Malviya added. The BJP has also attacked Rahul for calling Lord Ram ‘a mythological figure’ at the same interaction.

Calling the BJP a ‘fringe group’ he had slammed the saffron party saying that he did not view the BJP conception as a Hindu conception. “In terms of thinking, they are a fringe group, they are not mainstream. Now that they have captured political power, they have got a huge amount of wealth and they have got power, but they don't represent the large majority of Indian thinkers by any means," Gandhi had said.

In his reaction Malviya said, "Bhagwan Ram is not a mythological figure, he embodies the values, culture, and spiritual essence of Bharat. He represents maryada, sacrifice, and righteous leadership, which have shaped our civilization for thousands of years. He is the soul of Bharat and central to who we are as people."

He added that Rahul and the Congress should stop ridiculing the beliefs of billions of Hindus around the world. People like him and political parties will come and go, but Bhagwan Ram will forever remain a timeless symbol of dharma and an inspiration for generations to come," Malviya said.

The Congress leader had said, “All great political thinkers, social reformers and you go back 3000 years -- Buddha, Guru Nanak, Basava in Karnataka, Narayana Guru in Kerala, Phule, Gandhi, Ambedkar, and you see one stream. None of these are bigots. None of these people were saying 'we want to kill people, we want to isolate people, we want to crush people, we believe that things should be done in one particular way'. All these people, the voices of whom are in our Constitution, are essentially saying the same thing, that carry everybody along (and emphasizing on) truth and nonviolence."

He qualified his statement adding that this was the bedrock of Indian tradition and Indian history for him. “I don't know one person whom we consider great in India who wasn't of this type. All our mythological figures, Lord Ram was of that kind, where he was forgiving, he was compassionate. So, I don't consider what the BJP says to be the Hindu idea at all. I consider the Hindu idea to be much more pluralistic, much more embracing, much more affectionate, much more tolerant and open," he added.

He had underlined at the interaction that there have been many people in every single state and every community who stood for those ideas, lived for those ideas and died for those ideas. "And Gandhiji is one of those people; probably the best in modern times but there are many of them. To me, hatred and anger against people come from fear. If you are not scared, you don't hate anybody," he said.

Senior Congress leader Rahul Gandhi has come out saying that he is more than happy to take responsibility for everything his party has ever done wrong in its history.

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