After Ajay Rai's remark, Smriti Irani dares Rahul Gandhi to Amethi Lok Sabha fight

LUCKNOW: Congress's Varanasi strongman Ajay Rai's jibe at Union minister Smriti Irani that she visits her constituency Amethi only for "latka-jhatka" Tuesday invited a sharp retort from her directed at Rahul Gandhi, whom she dared to return to his lost family turf in 2024 and take her on.
"Have heard that @RahulGandhi got one of his provincial party functionaries to declare in an indecent manner that he intends to contest the Amethi seat in 2024. So, can I assume you will surely do so? You won't scamper to your second seat? Won't feel afraid?" Irani tweeted.
BJP's Sonbhadra women's wing chief Pushpa Singh filed an FIR against Rai, a former MLA and Congress's regional president, while the National Commission for Women summoned him to appear before it on December 28.
The FIR registered at Robertsganj police station in Sonbhadra is under sections 354(a) (sexually coloured remarks), 501 (printing or engraving matter known to be defamatory) and 509 (word, gesture or act intended to insult the modesty of a woman) of the IPC.
Rai, who is in Rajasthan for Rahul's Bharat Jodo Yatra, refused to apologise for his remark about Irani being allegedly interested in sashaying through her constituency and little else. A consignment of 10,000 blankets and as many farm-seed kits despatched by her arrived in Amethi recently for public distribution through an NGO, BJP sources said.Rai had said Monday that the next Lok Sabha election in Amethi would see the Gandhi family recovering their erstwhile pocketborough.
"The workers there and all of us demand that he (Rahul Gandhi) contest Amethi...Most of the factories here are on the verge of closure. Half of the factories in the Jagdishpur industrial area are shut," he said at a presser. BJP's Amethi district president Durgesh Tripathi said Irani had been an "active MP" in the constituency over the past three years.