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Santemaranahalli/Udupi/New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi today threw a challenge at Congress President Rahul Gandhi by asking him to deliver a speech on the achievements of his party’s government in Karnataka in Hindi, English or the mother tongue of his mother (Italian) 15 minutes, without reading from a piece of paper.

This was Modi’s pot shot at Rahul Gandhi, who had dared him to let him speak for 15 minutes in Parliament on corruption and other burning issues. The Prime Minister was addressing an election rally during the second leg of his election campaign at Santemaranahalli in Chamaraja district.

Launching a frontal attack on the Congress government in Karnataka, Modi said that it has built the culture of “ease of doing murder”. He also accused the successive Congress governments at the Centre of allowing a few people to “loot” banks while loans were denied to the poor.

The Congress did not lose the opportunity to hit back and said that the Prime Minister has nothing to say on allegations of corruption against his ministers, on the Rafale purchase issue and diamond merchant Nirav Modi.

Congress spokesperson Sushmita Dev said Modi’s speech today shows that he has nothing to say to counter the charges leveled by her party.