Union Minister Amit Shah has accused the Congress government in Telangana of not taking any action over the obscene clips that allegedly showed former prime minister HD Deve Gowda’s grandson and NDA candidate Prajwal Revanna sexually assaulting several women.

Speaking to reporters this morning, Mr Shah said the BJP stand is clear on the issue – that it is with the “matrushakti” (mothers or women).

“The BJP’s stand is clear that we stand with the ‘matrushakti‘ of the country. I want to ask Congress, whose government is there? The government is of Congress Party. Why they have not taken any action till now? We do not have to take action on this as this is a law and order issue of the state, state government has to take action on it,” he said.

The Union Minister said the BJP favours a probe in the case and pointed out that their alliance partner JD(S) is also set to take a step at a party meeting.

“It is very serious, we cannot tolerate it. We want to ask Congress that despite being in power, why hasn’t the government acted yet? Priyanka (Gandhi Vadra) ji should ask their Chief Minister and Deputy Chief Minister,” said Mr Shah.

Ms Gandhi had earlier criticised Prime Minister Narendra Modi over the sex scan involving the JD(S) leader.

Prajwal, a sitting MP from Karnataka’s Hassan constituency, is contesting the ongoing Lok Sabha polls, but the JD(S) has sought to distance the BJP from the case.

He has denied the allegations against him as “doctored” in a police complaint.

The alleged videos of him surfaced on Saturday, a day after his constituency went to polls. On Sunday, he left for Germany, pending a probe against him.

The police have lodged a case of sexual harassment and stalking against him while the Karnataka government has formed a Special Investigation Team (SIT) to probe the matter. The SIT will ask him to return to India, Karnataka Home Minister G Parameshwara said yesterday.

The Janta Dal (Secular), formed by Deve Gowda, has decided to suspend Prajwal over the sex clips, according to his uncle and former chief minister HD Kumaraswamy. But an official announcement is pending.

Home Minister Amit Shah today launched a frontal assault on the Congress after a deep-fake video of him saying he would remove reservations went viral. A Congress worker, Reetam Singh, from Assam’s Guwahati was arrested yesterday for allegedly making and sharing the deep-fake video of the Home Minister.

The deep-fake video showed Mr Shah talking about scrapping all reservations, while he was actually referring to removing quota only for Muslims on religious grounds in Telangana. The BJP had scrapped such a quota in Karnataka before it lost power to the Congress.

Mr Shah during a press conference today played both the videos to show what he actually said and what the doctored content projected him as saying.

“Giving quota on religious lines is unfair and cannot be allowed. We have already removed it in Karnataka. This was that I had said in the video,” Mr Shah told reporters today.

“The fake video twisted it to say the BJP will scrap all reservations,” the Home Minister said.

In fact, Mr Shah had said the BJP won’t remove reservations for Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, and Other Backward Classes, and also won’t allow anyone to do so, calling it “Modi’s guarantee.”

 “Rahul Gandhi says that if the BJP gets 400 seats, it will remove reservation. I want to say that we had a full majority for two terms, but Narendra Modi is a supporter of reservation. I want to say that it is a Modi guarantee that neither will the BJP remove reservations for SCs, STs and OBCs nor will it allow anyone to do so,” Mr Shah said.

Opposition parties have alleged the BJP’s call for “abki baar 400 paar” is aimed at winning 400 seats in the Lok Sabha elections to have the numbers in parliament to scrap quotas for ST, SC, and OBCs.

PM Modi revealed on Monday the untold story of how he ensured Pakistan was the first to officially hear about the 2019 Balakot airstrike, linking it to BJP-governed “new India’s policy of looking an adversary in the eye and speaking the truth rather than resorting to stealth”, reports Gururaj Jamkhandi.