The BJP on Wednesday described the lodging of an FIR against its IT department head Amit Malviya in Congress-ruled Karnataka as "pathetic" and alleged that it was done to intimidate and silence him.

Karnataka police has filed an FIR against the BJP's Amit Malviya for alleged defamation and instigating people against the Congress and Rahul Gandhi.

Reacting to the development, BJP national spokesperson Shehzad Poonawalla took to Twitter to slam the Congress and alleged, "The FIR against Amit Malviya is nothing but a malicious use of provisions of law to silence, intimidate." "At best, if Rahul Gandhi was aggrieved by any tweet, he could have filed a defamation case in court," he said.

"Using the state machinery to settle scores only shows that Congress' own communication and social media paraphernalia is supremely incompetent and hence needs a state police to fight its battles! Pathetic. See you in court," Poonawalla said.

The FIR was lodged based on a complaint by Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee member Ramesh Babu in connection with a tweet by Malviya. The tweet showed an animated video allegedly depicting Rahul Gandhi and Congress party in poor light.

Malviya has been booked under IPC sections 153(A), 120(B), 505(2) and 34 which pertain to promoting enmity between different groups on grounds of religion, race, place of birth, residence, language, and doing acts prejudicial to maintenance of harmony and conspiracy.

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