Congress, BJP slam Nitesh Rane's anti-Gujarati rant

AHMEDABAD: Maharashtra Congress MLA Nitesh Rane today drew severe flak from his party as well as BJP for passing "derogatory" remarks against Gujarati community staying in Mumbai.

"Nitesh Rane's tweet is his personal statement. As far as Congress is concerned, our party never endorses such irresponsible statements and ideology," said Gujarat unit party spokesperson Manish Doshi.

"Congress is always against dividing people in the name of language and territory. Any citizen of India can live and earn his livelihood anywhere in India," Doshi said.

Gujarat BJP General Secretary I K Jadeja registered a strong protest against the "anti-Gujarati" rant by Nitesh, son of senior Congress leader Narayan Rane, terming them as "cheap mentality".

"Narayan Rane's son has revealed his cheap mindset. Just like people from other states gave their contribution in the development Gujarat, Gujarati community gave their contribution in the development of Maharashtra. Thus, to have such mindset against Gujarati community is highly condemnable" Jadeja told reporters.

Nitesh, a first-term MLA, kicked off a storm saying that he wants to begin Prime Minister Narendra Modi's 'Clean India' campaign from Mumbai by cleaning the city of all Gujaratis who hate Marathis.

"Wanna take part in Swacha Bharat abhiyan n start from mumbai!! Wanna start cleaning up all the Marathi hating gujjus from there once for all," Nitesh posted on Twitter yesterday.