Union Home Minister Amit Shah mounted a fierce political offensive against Congress Member of Parliament and Leader of the Opposition Rahul Gandhi on Tuesday, addressing the party's persistent electoral downfalls. Rather than holding the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls accountable for poor outcomes at the voting booths, Shah urged the grand old party to conduct a thorough internal review of its strategy.

Drawing attention to the sustained decline of Congress in Gujarat over decades, the Home Minister asserted that the leadership must critically analyze why the voting public persistently refuses to support them, rather than shifting blame toward the Election Commission of India.

These statements emerged amid an intensifying pushback from Rahul Gandhi alongside other leaders of the opposition INDIA bloc, who have directed demonstrations against the Election Commission of India as well as Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar over the execution of the SIR process. Confronting these objections, the Union Home Minister dismantled the argument that revisions to the voter registry caused recent setbacks, reminding the opposition that their struggle to secure mandates had been ongoing long before this current administrative measure was ever introduced.

“I want to make this point clear, and specifically convey it to Rahul ji, that the Congress party has not won a single election in 41 years. The last election they won was back in 1985; since then, they have faced continuous defeats in Gujarat,” Shah said.

He reiterated that the Congress leadership must take an honest look at its own past track record instead of leaning on the SIR exercise as a convenient excuse for persistent failures.

“Rahul Gandhi should introspect: is it because of SIR that he is losing elections in Gujarat? Congress needs to introspect rather than blaming SIR,” Shah added.

Shah Cautions Rahul Gandhi Over 2029 General Election

Broadening his critique, Shah declared that Rahul Gandhi ought to get ready for yet another defeat when the country heads into the 2029 Lok Sabha elections. He maintained that the senior Congress representative has made a habit of misleading the general public and alleged that the pushback against the voter revision drive was fundamentally an effort to provide cover for infiltrators.

“Rahul Gandhi is constantly echoing lies,” Shah said, directly calling out the campaign run by Congress against the verification and revision of the electoral lists.

To reinforce his point, the Home Minister pointed toward by-election results across several regions, specifically noting losses suffered by the party in West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, and Puducherry. Shah highlighted that these outcomes clearly demonstrate that political and strategic shortfalls cannot simply be attributed to the SIR initiative, particularly since this procedural update was introduced strictly in the period following the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.

Going a step further into historical perspective, Shah reminded the opposition that Congress faced significant defeats even in eras when votes were recorded entirely on physical paper ballots. He characterized their present discourse as negative politics, going so far as to label the party's conduct as "anti-democracy" and "anti-Constitution." The core message behind his remarks was that casting doubts on established institutional mechanisms will never resolve the profound organizational weaknesses and strategic missteps troubling the party from within.

BJP Claims 90 Out of 104 Seats in Gujarat Civic Elections

Turning to grassroots mandates, Shah placed the spotlight on recent results from civic body elections in Gujarat, offering the outcome as tangible proof of the Bharatiya Janata Party's enduring trust among voters in Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s home state.

Providing official metrics from the contest, the Home Minister shared that the BJP captured 90 of the 104 available seats spread across three municipal areas, which included two municipalities and one major municipal corporation.

Focusing on the Gandhinagar Municipal Corporation—an administrative hub located directly within his parliamentary constituency—the BJP clinched 38 of the total 44 ward seats. Shah underscored that the party simultaneously expanded its vote share within the municipal body, registering an increase of 10 percentage points relative to the previous civic election.

Taking aim at the Aam Aadmi Party, Shah observed that although the organization fielded candidates across all 32 contested seats, it failed to retain a single security deposit.

“This massive victory in Gujarat reflects the mood of the state’s voters, demonstrating that the electorate of Gujarat stands rock-solid behind Narendra Modi ji,” Shah said.

In the same address, he drew parallels with local governance polls in Rajasthan, stating that the BJP had also recorded an overwhelming and decisive sweep across those municipal contests.

Electoral Roll Row Fuels Ongoing Political Standoff

This sharp exchange highlights the deepening rift between opposition parties and the Election Commission over the operational handling of the SIR. Rahul Gandhi, working in tandem with leaders of the broader INDIA coalition, has positioned this administrative verification effort at the forefront of their institutional critiques against the election watchdog.

Shah’s rejoinder, however, insists that repeated losses at the ballots require an uncompromising re-evaluation of Congress's political direction, messaging, and party apparatus. By pointing to forty years of struggle in Gujarat alongside multiple recent bypoll reversals, he challenged the foundation of the opposition's narrative that seeks to connect democratic setbacks to electoral roll updates.

With the 2029 general elections awaiting down the line, Shah delivered a direct mandate to Rahul Gandhi: rather than directing grievances toward routine updates of voter registers, the Congress must confront the internal reasons why citizens continue to turn away from them at the polls.