Speaking after Congress’ impressive show in MP, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh, Rahul Gandhi says will defeat BJP again.
New Delhi: After an impressive show in the assembly election results Tuesday, Congress president Rahul Gandhi said the farmers and the youth of the country have spoken in favour of his party and sent a clear message to Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
“Clear message for the BJP that the country is not happy with what they are doing, with demonetisation and with GST,” Gandhi said at a press conference.
“BJP and Narendra Modi have failed to provide a vision for the future of this country,” Gandhi said.
“We have defeated them today. We will defeat them again. But hum kisi ko mukt nahi karna chahate (We don’t want to get rid of them),” he said, in a veiled reference to BJP’s ‘Congress-Mukt Bharat’ campaign.
In the five-state assembly election results Tuesday, Congress was leading in Chhattisgarh and Rajasthan. The fight in Madhya Pradesh remained neck and neck.
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Farmer distress, jobs
Gandhi said the central themes of the election were employment and farmer distress. “We need a strategic solution for these,” he said.
Stressing on the “scam” that was demonestisation, and corruption in the Rafale deal, Gandhi also flagged the exit of Urjit Patel as a testament to the damage that the BJP-led government had wrecked on the Indian economy.
“With a resurgent Congress party in these states, and other states where non-BJP parties have come to power, a strong opposition can be created,” Gandhi said.
Responding to Congress’s loss in Telangana and Mizoram, Gandhi said, “I would have preferred a better result in Telangana.”
The party’s performance in the three crucial states of the Hindi heartland has come as a big boost for Gandhi ahead of the Lok Sabha elections in 2019. The assembly elections were being seen as a critical test of Gandhi’s leadership, who took over the reigns of the party exactly a year ago.
1. Hearty congratulations to the Congress President Shri Rahul Gandhi and his colleagues. 2. Is it not true that in the past Congress too, the Congress party has won elections just as it has done in December, 2018. But it has been demonstrated again and again that victory in any election for any political party does not always mean justice for the poor. This is a bitter reality and it is true for all political parties. Election victory means that ordinary voters have been fooled by manifesto and other election promises. They were fooled in earlier election won by every political party in our country. 2. It has been claimed by the Congress party leaders, particularly by Shri Rahul Gandhi, that the Congress will protect and further interests of small farmers, traders and others. I wish to say that as regards problems of farmers, unless we recognise that almost seventy per cent of rural households in our country cannot depend on farm income alone for livelihood, all our agricultural policies and programmes will benefit only a top layer of farmers and will make them more rich & powerful at cost of the poor. 3. I do not think that political parties in the Hindi felt have learnt any lesson from the past. Policy like implementation of a minimum support price will, I believe, not be good enough and will be of little use unless we make efforts to build modern warehouses for farm produce and ensure that small farmers get real freedom to sell their produce at remunerative price.
4. In 2018 Assembly election campaign in the Hindi belt, the Congress President Mr. Rahul Gandhi has made allegations of corruption against PM Mr Narendra Modi. We know that the ruling party in the Centre is in control of all CBI and other investigation agencies which investigate all corruption cases. I believe Mr Gandhi would do a great service to the nation if he and his party demand a legal set-up which will be free from political interference and will be allowed to investigate and deal with corruption cases against all politicians, especially all ministers, MPs MLAs, etc. For this an appropriate amendment to our Criminal and Civil Procedure Codes and possibly a few more laws may be required. 5. Recently, the Supreme Court had made a suggestion to the Union govt about setting up of fast track Special Courts. NDA government has proposed a bill which provides for establishment of Special Courts as suggested by the Court. However, the Congress has opposed Special Courts in both houses of Parliament. This means that both Mr Gandhi and his party are not honest about need to curb corruption.