India Today Group journalist Mausami Singh jumped to the defence of Rahul Gandhi when he accused her of being a BJP spokesperson during a media interaction.
While talking to The Lallantop journalist Saurabh Dwivedi, she stated, “I was also surprised as to why Rahul Gandhi brought up BJP into this but there’s a history behind it. For the last ten years, his ecosystem believes that the Indian media has played a major role in hurting his image. Congress party also made similar claims. There was discrimination in order to build the brand Modi and demolish Rahul Gandhi’s reputation. It was very important for the saffron party. He is of the opinion that the media played an instrumental part in it. He was also asked about it in the briefing later and he clarified that he had no intention to hurt any reporter or cast aspersions on their professional integrity.”
She added, “However, he added that the media tycoons and the owners of these companies are answerable for the role they played. Therefore, he raises such questions in press conferences. However, he has talked with journalists and must have realised that you can’t shoot the messenger. You won’t gain anything from it. Now, he has returned as the Leader of the Opposition and he met me ten days later and acknowledged me as I was outside the parliament. He asked me ‘How are you?’ He feels that let bygones be bygones and this is not the way to talk to the reporters.
Saurabh Dwivedi had asked, “It’s okay to be aggressive but a journalist like Mausami Singh asks a question and it is labelled as briefed by the Bharatiya Janata Party. They can boast about attending press conferences but it is quite different from attacking the journalists and one doesn’t make the other right.”
The incident occurred earlier in June when Mausami Singh asked the Gandhi scion that the Opposition repeatedly demand JPC and disrupt multiple parliament sessions which led to a waste of public money.
An aggressive Rahul Gandhi humiliated Singh publicly and told her to wear a shirt with the BJP party symbol. This led to a heated argument between the two.