Lok Sabha Elections 2019: Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) President Amit Shah on Sunday took a pod shot on Congress President Rahul Gandhi claiming that the Prime Minister Narendra Modi has been working tirelessly 18 hours a day from past 20 hours unlike Rahul Gandhi who takes prolonged leaves, leaving, Sonia Gandhi clueless about his whereabouts. “Narendra Modi works 18 hours every day. Rahul Gandhi runs away, his mother (Sonia Gandhi) has to look for him," said Shah during one of his election rallies in Bihar’s Sitamarhi.

BJP President has been addressing back-to-back election rallies in Sitamarhi and Saran Lok Sabha segments set to go to polls in the fifth phase of Lok Sabha Election. Shah also drew a contrast between PM Modi and Rahul Gandhi, claiming that the prime minister has been working tirelessly for the past 20 years unlike the Congress president ‘who needs a prolonged holiday every few months’.

Shah also charged the Rahul Gandhi-led Congress and its allies with lack of resolve, while in power, to act decisively against terror and take affirmative action in favour of the backward classes and the poor in the unreserved category.

Lambasting the Congress-led UPA for its alleged inadequate response to the beheading of Lance Naik Hemraj six years ago, Shah said, “When militants backed by Pakistan dared to attack the Uri army camp, we gave a befitting reply with surgical strikes.”

“They did not learn their lessons and attacked the CRPF convoy at Pulwama. Pakistan massed its troops along the borders thinking that it would protect itself against surgical strikes. But our prime minister showed that he is a man with a 56-inch chest and thus came the air strikes that destroyed the terror hideouts in Balakot," Shah said further in his speech.

"Rahul baba has the temerity of saying that if voted to power his party will scrap the sedition law. Let me assure him and his allies, as long as the BJP is in power, anti-national elements will continue ending up behind bars and every bullet fired from terrorists will be retaliated with a mortar shell," the BJP president added further.

He also targeted the Congress and the RJD, which have been alleging that Modi's claim of belonging to a backward caste was false, asserting that the prime minister understands the pain of the downtrodden. Further in his speech, Shah also pointed out no government in the past mustered the courage to take measures for the economically weak section in the unreserved category.

The BJP chief also said that the jodi (duo) of Chief Minister Nitish Kumar and Deputy Chief Minister Sushil Kumar Modi had brought Bihar out of the era of lawlessness, asserting that “things have started moving at an unprecedented speed ever since Modi formed the government at the Centre”.