New Delhi:
Home Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde, criticised by the BJP for attending a Bollywood event hours after multiple blasts killed six people in Patna on Sunday, has found support from External Affairs Minister and fellow Congressman Salman Khurshid.
Mr Khurshid has argued that "Mr Shinde has a life beyond Patna."
The minister has in turn accused the BJP of "playing politics" and asked why the party went ahead with Narendra Modi's rally despite the multiple blasts. "You criticise Mr Shinde for carrying on with his life as usual. Mr Modi went on with his speech? Not a word about the people who died, not a word about what had happened? Because it was not in the script or was it in the script that we hadn't seen?"
(Why Narendra Modi went ahead with Patna rally despite blasts)On Sunday morning, seven low-intensity blasts ripped through Patna just before Mr Modi, the BJP's prime ministerial candidate, addressed a massive rally. Most of those explosions were in and around Gandhi Maidan, the rally venue.
That evening, Mr Shinde, who has charge of the country's law and order, spent nearly an hour at the music launch of Bollywood film Rajjo, posing for photographs with actors. The film's director, Vishwas Patil, is a former IAS officer from Maharashtra and said to be close to the Home Minister.
(Home Minister Shinde at Bollywood event after Patna blasts, BJP asks why)The BJP's Arun Jaitley said, "I think it was indifference and if you have that attitude then any terrorist strike is an act of business as usual."
His colleague Venkaiah Naidu offered, "There is nothing wrong with going for a music performance launch etc at any other time. But here there were blasts. One would have expected the Home Minister to go there."
Mr Shinde justified not changing his plans because of the blasts, saying he had immediately sent crack investigating teams to the spot and was in regular touch with officials.
"Since the bomb blast at 9.30 am, I have been getting updates about the situation. I have spoken to the Chief Minister of Bihar a few times. In the afternoon itself I sent an NIA (National Investigation Agency) team and a bomb inquiry squad to Patna by plane," he told reporters.
In May this year, Mr Shinde was criticised for not cutting short a visit to the US when top Congress leaders were killed in a brazen attack by Maoists in Chhattisgarh.