Lampooning Modi or BJP does not make Aiyar 'anti-national': NCP

Defending Congress leader Mani Shankar Aiyar's right to lampoon and criticise Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the BJP as an Indian citizen, the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) on Tuesday said there was no way he could be described as 'anti-national' for airing his views with a news channel in Pakistan.

"Mani has criticised the Bharatiya Janata Party and said it is not the proper dispensation in power which can take India further on the road to development and progress, and that it may divide the country, there is nothing wrong in that. That is his personal view. We can't attribute too much to his expression," NCP leader Majeed Memon told ANI.

"He has not violated any law. Nobody from the BJP is entitled to call him 'anti-national' only because he has made this statement," he added.

Memon further pointed out that in a democracy one has the right to disagree with the ruling party and if Aiyar has done it, then there is nothing wrong in that.

Aiyar, who went to Pakistan before the Bihar Assembly polls, said in an interview to the Duniya TV channel, that Islamabad should help India to remove Prime Minister Modi from power if it wants relations between the two countries to progress.