The BJP got a breather on Saturday as its Rajya Sabha MP Subramanian Swamy turned his ire towards Robert Vadra for calling him "attention seeking" and "deplorable".
In his Facebook post, the son-in-law of Congress president Sonia Gandhi responded to Swamy's comments that ministers while abroad wearing coat and tie looked like waiters, in an apparent jibe at finance minister Arun Jaitley who was wearing a suit during his Beijing visit.
"So is there no dignity in being a Waiter?!" Vadra wrote on Saturday. "The attention seeking BJP MP Swamy’s comment ‘Ministers who wear a coat and tie ‘look like waiters’ and must be instructed to wear Indian clothes.’
Undermining waiters who work hard for a living; making condescending and derogatory remarks about them is deplorable and classist (sic).”
Within minutes, Swamy snapped at him. "I think Mr Vadra should concentrate on staying out of jail and not comment on political issues," he was quoted by news agencies as telling reporters in Thiruvananthapuram.
However, a day after there were indications that the BJP was anguished over his comments against Union ministers and officials, Swamy played down his diatribe.
He refuted that his comments on ministers wearing coats looking like waiters was aimed at Jaitley. "This is part of bharatiyakaran. I have always been in Indian clothes and I have always practiced what I preach. It was not aimed at anyone else. Actually Mr Jaitley looks very good, he looks like an exception," Swamy said.
Later, at a press conference he claimed that his threat of “bloodbath” was misunderstood and that he only hinted at “chaos”.
“I said I am the most disciplined person. If I was indisciplined, there would not be what they called as bloodshed. Bloodshed did not mean blood spilling. Bloodshed means there will be chaos. And I said that because I am disciplined, nothing of that kind happened,” he said.
Asked about the BJP's unhappiness over his targeting the finance ministry, Swamy said he was not aware of it.
Interestingly, Vadra's reaction came even as the BJP refrained from making any public comment against its MP. The party, however, was upset with the unabated tirade unleashed by Swamy against senior ministers and officials.
The BJP also was silent on Vadra's castigation of Swamy, who has been targeting mainly Jaitley.
Party sources had said that several leaders were of the view that the leadership should step in to ensure that Swamy stopped training his guns on ministers and officials.
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