ISRO=Nehru's Vision vs Over The Moon: 'X'-factor in Contrasting 'Chandra Yarns' of Congress And BJP

As the Chandrayaan-3‘s Vikram lander made a historic touchdown on the dark side of the moon after a journey of 384,000 km that put India in an elite group of spacefaring nations, the stark contrast between the ruling BJP and the main opposition Congress’s responses on social media to the momentous event became a topic of discussion. While the Bharatiya Janata Party congratulated Indian Space Research Organisation scientists, the grand old party’s focus has been on crediting India’s first Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, and his legacy for Wednesday’s phenomenal feat. The post is rather straight: “It was independent India’s first Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, whose scientific outlook and vision laid the foundation of Indian space research.” Another post has a 3-minute 12-second-long audio-visual, which was kept ready by the Congress, that once again hammered in the same point—Chandrayaan-3’s success is because of the “vision” of Nehru. The anchor is heard saying, “Pt Nehru ke paas vision tha, doordarshita thi.” It also shows visuals from 1984 of the then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi asking India’s first spacefarer Rakesh Sharma, “Upar se Bharat kaisa dikhta hai aap ko?” The entire post is titled “ISROs journey = journey of Nehru Ji’s vision”. PM, BJP chief vs Congress president, Jairam Ramesh The BJP’s social media posts for the Chandrayaan-3 success carried statements of two people: Prime Minister Narendra Modi and party chief JP Nadda.