Bharatiye Janata Party's leader Amit Malviya courted controversy on Saturday as he used some nasty and derogatory terms on live television against renowned Indian journalist Rajdeep Sardesai.
The Congress on Saturday snatched Karnataka, which was the only state in the region under the saffron party. The party won 136 seats out of 224 while the BJP managed to bag 65 seats in the state.
The BJP's IT cell chief lost his cool on Sardesai after the party's heavy defeat in the Karnataka Assembly Elections 2023. He even accused Sardesai of being a "propagandist" while covering the elections.
"This is propaganda… You should go… You should retire… You are 58...!
"You should go and write your third book on how BJP wins the 2024 election… You go and prostrate yourself before Sonia Gandhi and ask for a Rajya Sabha seat," he told Sardesai on India Today's live debate.
Sardesai managed to keep his cool throughout the debate and asked Malviya not to threaten him.
"You better be careful…Please don't threaten me," Sardesai said before offering to send Malviya a box of sweets to cool him down.
How BJP lost in Karnataka
Weighed down by anti-incumbency, the BJP heavily banked on Prime Minister Narendra Modi's personal appeal to enable it to sail through in the Assembly elections but it was not to be.
Modi addressed as many as 19 meetings and held six roadshows in an aggressive campaign to shore up the party's prospects in the May 10 Assembly elections.
In addition to BJP President J P Nadda, several of the party's top guns including Union Home Minister Amit Shah and Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath had campaigned in the state.
Asked whether the Modi and Shah factor did not work in this election, Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai said there are various factors for this outcome and one can speak about it after a thorough analysis.
Bommai said the Congress' "much organised" election strategy might have been one of the major reasons for its win.
