Gujarat riots: Ahmed Patel plotted against Narendra Modi, say police; Congress hits out

The police's claim has drawn ire from the Congress months ahead of the Gujarat assembly elections due to be held late this year. 

The Gujarat Police has already opposed the bail plea of activist Teesta Setalvad, who is one of two people arrested by Ahmedabad Crime Branch on the charge of conspiring to falsely implicate people in the riots, which had shaken Gujarat politics back then.

Gujarat Police's Special Investigation Team or SIT said Setalvad was a part of a larger conspiracy hatched by Patel, who was a close aide of Congress president Sonia Gandhi, to uninstall the Modi-led Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government in the state after the riots.

Reacting to the SIT's claim in an affidavit before the sessions court, BJP spokesperson Sambit Patra attacked the Congress and Gandhi tweeting, "The Conspiracy to malign the Image of Gujarat was hatched by Teesta Setalvad & her accomplices at the behest of Sh Ahmed Patel.

"Ahmed Patel ji was the Political Advisor of Congress President Smt Sonia Gandhi. BUCK STOPS AT THE DOOR OF SONIA GANDHI!"

Slamming the BJP and Modi, Congress leader Jairam Ramesh said, "The Prime Minister's political vendetta machine clearly does not even spare the departed who were his political adversaries. This SIT is dancing to the tune of its political master and will sit wherever it is told to.

"We know how an earlier SIT chief was rewarded with a diplomatic assignment after he had given a 'clean chit' to the Chief Minister."

(Images: PIB and Wikipedia)