Fear created by PM Modi history now: Rahul Gandhi in US address

Congress leader Rahul Gandhi has said the results of the general elections in India this summer destroyed the "idea of Modi" and the "fear" created by the prime minister vanished, becoming "history".

The Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha is currently on a four-day visit to the United States. He addressed the prestigious Georgetown University and attended another event in Herndon, a Virginia suburb of Washington DC on Monday, 9 September.

Addressing the event, Gandhi said the Lok Sabha elections were not fought on a level playing field. However, he added, the ruling coalition led by the BJP had collapsed, breaking "right down the middle".

Asserting that things have changed after the Lok Sabha results were announced, Gandhi said, "The fear created by Modi-ji vanished in a second. It took years to cultivate that fear, a lot of planning and money was involved but it took only a second for it to evaporate."

Prime minister Narendra Modi formed a government for the third consecutive time after the Lok Sabha elections this year. However, the BJP was not able get a majority on its own this time, and really needed its NDA allies to form the government (unlike in Modi's last term).

"I can tell you that the idea of Mr Modi — 56-inch chest, direct connection with God — that's all gone. Its history now," Gandhi said.

He also claimed the ruling coalition had collapsed and was broken "right down the middle":

Alleging that the Lok Sabha elections were not fought as a fair and equal contest, Gandhi said, "I don't see it as a free election. I see it as a heavily controlled election."

"I don't believe that in a fair election, the BJP would come anywhere near 246 seats. I would be surprised," he said, asserting that the party had a "huge financial advantage".

"The Congress party fought the elections with their bank accounts frozen and has basically destroyed the idea of Modi. You can see it because when you see the prime minister now in Parliament..., he is psychologically trapped, and he basically cannot come to terms, he cannot understand how this has happened," he said.

Responding to a question, Gandhi said that halfway through the campaign, Prime Minister Modi didn't think he would get anywhere near 300 or 400 seats.

“I think early on he realised that this thing's going wrong. We were getting inputs from regular sources... It was pretty clear that they were in trouble,” he said.

“So, there was this internal thing going on in the prime minister that I could see. And psychologically, 'How is this now happening?' Because he's a person [who has] — as you know, he was [chief minister] in Gujarat for many years — never faced political adversity, then [became] prime minister of India. Suddenly, this idea started to crack,” Gandhi said.

"So people think that, well, this was the prime minister sort of saying that, look, 'I'm special, I'm unique, and I talk to God'. But that's not how we saw it. Internally, we saw it as a psychological collapse: 'What happened here? How is this thing not working?'” he said.

"Now that idea has been replaced," Gandhi added.

Gandhi, who arrived in the US on Saturday, 7 September, interacted with members of the Indian diaspora and with youth in Dallas, Texas. He also plans to meet lawmakers and senior officials of the US government in Washington DC.