Rahul targets Modi over admission of marriage

Rahul Gandhi, Vice President of India's ruling Congress party waves to his party supporters during a rally ahead of general elections in New Delhi April 6, 2014. India, the world's largest democracy, will hold its general election in nine stages staggered between April 7 and May 12. Photo: Reuters

Narendra Modi's admission in a poll affidavit that he is married to Jashodaben Chimanlal, a retired schoolteacher he separated from decades ago, led to wordy political exchanges today.

Congress Vice-president Rahul Gandhi attacked Modi for never acknowledging his wife in the past, reports NDTV, a New Delhi-based news channel.

Addressing a rally in Jammu and Kashmir, Rahul said "We don't know how many elections he has fought, but for the first time he has written that he is married. In Delhi, they talk about respecting women... but his wife's name never found its way into the affidavit."

Hours later, thousands of kilometres away in Chhattisgarh,  Modi seemed to respond to  Gandhi's attack when he said, also at a rally, "They are not willing to give an account of their own work and yet they go around the country asking Modi to explain himself."

On Wednesday, Modi, in his poll affidavit as the BJP's candidate from Vadodara in Gujarat, wrote the name "Jashodaben" in the column for spouse - a field he had left blank in the four assembly elections he contested in the past. 

Modi's older brother Somabhai Damodar Modi said his marriage was a formality and he gave it up to serve the country.

Jashodaben, 62, lives with her brother in a village in western Gujarat and is reportedly on a pilgrimage at present.

Congress leaders say the Election Commission should consider action against Modi for filing what they call false affidavits in the past.

The BJP's Nirmala Sitharaman said, "If false affidavits are really the issue, I will be compelled to ask about the false affidavits which Rahul Gandhi and Sonia Gandhi gave about their educational qualifications. Let them clarify those too."