Amethi (UP): Congress president Rahul Gandhi on Monday did not comment over a query on the acquittal of right-wing Swami Aseemanand and four others in the 2007 Mecca Masjid blast by a special anti-terror court.

The Congress Chief, who began started his three-day visit to his Lok Sabha constituency Amethi and the neighbouring district of Rae Bareli, refused to take any question on the recent Hyderabad court verdict, while he was emerging out of a programme.

When a reporter posed a question for Rahul Gandhi to comment on the verdict, Rahul Gandhi ignored the question and told his driver to move ahead.

Following the verdict, the BJP party slammed the Congress on Monday on the issue, saying that the opposition party’s “appeasement politics” of “defaming” Hindus has been exposed.

BJP spokesperson Sambit Patra alleged that the Congress was on a mission to “defame” Hindus to get votes and demanded that party President Rahul Gandhi and his predecessor Sonia Gandhi apologise for such terms like “saffron terror” and “Hindu terror.”

The National Investigation Team court earlier had acquitted Aseemanand and another four in the Mecca Masjid blast case by ruling that the prosecution had not proved charges against the accused in the case.

A blast was triggered which ripped through the Mecca Masjid on May 8, 2007, during Friday prayers. The blast killed nine people and wounded 58.

The case investigation began with the local police before it was transferred to the CBI, and at last it was again it was transferred to the country’s premier anti-terror investigation agency NIA in 2011.

The Congress chief was given a warm welcome by his party workers when he arrived here.

He paid a visit to the house of a senior party leader Babban Dwivedi at Pure Bargain to express condolences over the death of his mother and apart from that he also met some farmers who were working in the fields and inquired about their condition.

He also went to the Pali, Urermau and Teunsi villages that come under Jagdishpur assembly and sought to know about the local people’s problem.

Local BJP leaders, meanwhile said that the programme of Congress president to inaugurate a five-km-long road built under the PMGSY had been put on hold.

“The road in Thauri area was constructed under the PMGSY, and it will be inaugurated by Smriti Irani… Rahul Gandhi will be invited to that programme and, if he wants, he can attend it,” BJP’s district unit president Uma Shankar Pandey said.

When contacted, PMGSY’s Executive Engineer K K Srivastava said the road is under construction and is still incomplete and cannot be inaugurated till it’s built completely.

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