Shehla Rashid accuses Nitin Gadkari, RSS of plotting Narendra Modi's assassination; transport minister threatens to sue

Nitin Gadkari has threatened to take legal action against JNU student rights activist Shehla Rashid after she accused the Union minister for road transport and highways of planning to assassinate Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Rasheed had also said that the RSS was a complicit, and alleged that the motive was to blame the assassination on Muslims and Communists.

Without naming Rashid, Gadkari later tweeted that he would take action against “anti-social elements” attributing “personal motives to him”.

I would be taking legal action on anti-social elements who have made bizzare comments; attributing personal motives to me, regarding the assassination threat to PM @narendramodi

— Nitin Gadkari (@nitin_gadkari) June 9, 2018

Rashid then hit back saying that the Union minister was getting worked up over a sarcastic tweet, and asked him to think about what JNU leader Umar Khalid might be going through “after a baseless media assault on him and his father”. She then asked if Gadkari would also “take action against Rahul Shivshankar”.

Rashid’s tweet and exchange of words with Gadkari comes in the context of a letter, allegedly written by Maoists, that carried details of plans to launch a ‘Rajiv Gandhi type incident’ to target Modi, and Umar Khalid reportedly filing a complaint with the Delhi Police alleging that he received death threats from a man who identified himself as fugitive gangster Ravi Pujari. Interestingly, Khalid had clarified later that he didn’t receive any direct threat but was informed by Dalit leader Jignesh Mevani — who also claimed to have received a death threat from Pujari — of being in the fugitive gangster’s hit list. Pune police claim to have seized a letter dated 18 April this year from five people arrested in connection with the Bhima Koregaon violence in which they talk of a “plot” to assassinate India’s prime minister Narendra Modi in a “Rajiv Gandhi-type” attack. Former Indian prime minister Rajiv Gandhi was killed in Sriperumbedur, Tamil Nadu, on 21 May 1991 by a Sri Lankan suicide bomber. Pune Police said the letter they intercepted was written by R to “comrade Prakash” was found in the laptop of Rona Wilson, an alleged Maoist. Wilson, Sudhir Dhawale, Surendra Gadling, Mahesh Raut and Shoma Sen were arrested Wednesday. Rashid has told India Today that the letter about a Modi assassination is “fake and to divert attention from government failures”.