In a swipe at Rahul Gandhi, Union Home Minister Amit Shah said the Congress leader should contest the upcoming Lok Sabha elections from Amethi in Uttar Pradesh. In the interview with media while campaigning in Gujarat's Gandhinagar, Amit Shah said it was obvious to the voters and the media why Rahul Gandhi was not entering the fray from Amethi.

"I think Rahul Gandhi should contest the Lok Sabha polls from the Amethi seat," Amit Shah said when asked about the Congress leader's assertion that the BJP would win less than 150 seats.

Rahul Gandhi has won the Amethi seat three consecutive times since 2004. However, he was defeated by BJP's Smriti Irani by 55,000 votes in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls.

While the BJP has re-nominated Smriti Irani from the Amethi seat, the Congress is yet to name its nominee. Speculation has been rife that Rahul Gandhi, who will fight from Kerala's Wayanad, may also contest from Amethi.

On allegations by Priyanka Gandhi that the BJP would not cross the 180-seat mark without EVM manipulation, Amit Shah said the Congress has a habit of abusing EVMs when they lose polls and praising them when they win.

"The Congress won elections in Telangana, Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan using the same EVMs. They resort to abusing EVMs when they lose polls," Amit Shah said.

Training his guns on West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, the Home Minister cited the Sandeshkhali issue to assert that women and villagers were not safe under the Trinamool Congress regime.

Sandeshkhali in West Bengal was on the boil after several women levelled allegations of land grab and sexual harassment by TMC strongman Shahjahan Sheikh and his aides.

On the Opposition's allegations that the 29 Naxalites gunned down in Chhattisgarh was a "fake encounter", Amit Shah said the Opposition had lost its mind. "In the third term of the Narendra Modi government, we will uproot Naxalism from our nation within the next two years," he said.

Source: India Today