Panaji, May 4 : Congress MP Shashi Tharoor on Friday urged the people of Goa to vote for INDIA bloc candidates in the Lok Sabha elections "to protect democracy, diversity, stop corruption and 'washing machine politics'".

"Is it democratic to freeze accounts of opposition parties, BJP has done it to us. Is it democratic to lock up the opposition party leader, who is a chief minister of a state, they did it to Arvind Kejriwal. Is it democratic to selectively raid opponents' helicopters, to check if they carrying money? Why don't they raid helicopters, planes or cars of BJP leaders? This is not the way democracy is supposed to function. The way BJP is functioning people can see how one-sided it is," the Congress leader said while addressing a press conference here.

He also claimed that there is weaponisation of investigating agencies and opposition leaders are "selectively targeted".

"BJP washing machine cleans the charges, whoever joins them. The charges against them suddenly disappear," Tharoor said.

He further said that the BJP has displayed its "weakness and desperation by locking the leader of a national opposition party in jail". "Why did they do it in the middle of the election,' he asked.

Tharoor claimed that in this Lok Sabha election, the BJP will get "some big surprises".

"We have got a good feedback in two phases. Even from Hindi speaking states we received good feedbacks," he said.

/IANS