Overview
- Rahul Gandhi used a staged hug with Congress leader Sandeep Dikshit to mock Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s foreign‑policy style and responded to a quip about Italy’s Giorgia Meloni by saying he had “not reached there yet,” an exchange widely reported from the Rachnatmak Congress convention.
- Senior BJP and NDA leaders including Rajnath Singh, Devendra Fadnavis and J.P. Nadda condemned the remarks as indecent and damaging to India’s prestige and several demanded a public apology.
- The Ministry of External Affairs urged that views about foreign leaders be expressed respectfully and stressed India’s strong ties with Italy, making the row also a diplomatic sensitivity rather than only a domestic spat.
- Congress defended Gandhi, saying his gesture targeted Modi’s diplomatic style not Meloni personally, and the dispute has taken on a procedural edge after Gandhi and Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge again skipped the Red Fort Independence Day ceremony for the second consecutive year.
- Gandhi’s separate allegation that China has blocked Indian patrols in parts of Arunachal Pradesh remains unverified in published coverage and has not received a substantive official response, leaving that claim a developing element of the wider confrontation.