Election in Chhattisgarh: The Prime Minister was speaking at Mahasamund, a Congress bastion.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi ripped into the Congress and its Nehru-Gandhi legacy today over the party's comment that a "tea seller" could have the country's top job owing to the foundation laid by Jawaharlal Nehru. Speaking at the battleground state of Chhattisgarh - where opinion polls predicted a wafer-thin majority for the Congress -- PM Modi said it was just a ruse to take credit. The Congress has given shabby treatment to any leader who did not belong to the Nehru-Gandhi family, he said.
As an example, he cited Sitaram Kesri, the Congress stalwart who took charge of the party from 1996 to 1998. "Sitaram Kesri, a Dalit leader, was thrown out of office and into the footpath" to make way for Sonia Gandhi to take over the reins of the party, he said.
"They say it was by the largesse of Nehru-ji that a tea seller could become the Prime Minister of India. They make such claims to get credit," he said.
"Make a person outside the Nehru-Gandhi the Congress President for five years and I will agree that Pandit Nehru made a 'Chaiwallah' the OM. India has not forgotten how a stalwart like Sitaram Kesri Ji was treated by one family," he tweeted later to underscore the point.
The Prime Minister was speaking at Mahasamund, a Congress bastion that was won by an Independent, Vimal Chopra, in 2013. In recent years, the BJP won it only once - in 2003.
The battle for Chhattisgarh, where the BJP is seeking a fourth term in power, is being fought tooth and nail between the two parties. After the BJP being in power for three terms, the Congress is hoping that anti-incumbency will deliver the state to them.
A poll of opinion polls predicted that the Congress will win 47 of the state's 90 seats -- just one above the majority mark of 46. The BJP will get 39 seats, down from last time's score of 49 seats.
On Saturday, the Congress slammed PM Modi for his nana-nani, dada-dadi (grandparents) jibe. Speaking at Chhattisgarh last week, PM Modi said instead of developing the country, the Congress had tried to improve the fortunes of the Nehru-Gandhi family.
In a jibe at Congress chief Rahul Gandhi, the Prime Minister had asked if his "grandparents" helped Chhattisgarh progress by laying out water pipelines.
Today, senior Congress leader Kapil Sibal hit out, apparently at the BJP's ideological mentor, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, saying the ancestors of the BJP had sided with the British when Jawaharlal Nehru was laying the foundation of modern India.
"When you were young, Nehruji laid the foundation of a modern industrial India. But your party's nana nanis dada dadis collaborated with the British," he tweeted.