Roorkie, May 10: Lashing out at BJP
leader LK Advani, Congress general secretary Rahul Gandhi on Sunday accused the Saffron party stalwart of not standing
behind his Prime Minister during the Kandahar hijack crisis.
"The strong leader did not know that terrorists were
being released. When we asked, he (Advani) said Vajpayee did
it. A leader who is strong always stands by his Prime
Minister...he should have resigned," Gandhi said ridiculing
Advani`s claim of being a strong leader.
Campaigning for Congress` Haridwar Parliamentary
constituency candidate Harish Rawat, Gandhi wondered how
Advani could "blame" Vajpayee for this as he is no longer in
politics.
"But they say Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is weak. When
the nuclear deal was being signed, I went to Prime Minister
Singh. He said even if the Left did not support the
government, let it fall as the future of power generation and
technology was at stake," he said insisting that such was the
strength of Singh.
Advocating for a new orientation for development in
Uttarakhand, Gandhi said in the last 25 years in neighbouring
Uttar Pradesh, governments came and went but did nothing for
the development of the state.
Uttarakhand was a part of UP till the year 2000.
"We do not do the politics of caste, we do not do the
politics of religion. We have to do politics for development
of Uttarakhand," Rahul said charging the BJP government of the
state with stalling progress in the last over two years since
it came to power.
In his speech, Gandhi lampooned the `India Shining`
slogan of BJP in the 2004 elections, accusing the Saffron
party of "creating two Indias: one for the rich and the other
for the common people".
"We ran a government for the common people in the last
five years. We gave a growth rate of nine percent. During NDA
it was only five percent...we did it with your (common man)
participation," he said.
Gandhi listed the UPA`s flagship NREGA programme and loan
waiver scheme for farmers as examples of the concern of
Congress for the common people, farmers and workers.
Pitching for farmers, Gandhi said "this country cannot
run without farmers. The farmers give us food. If they give us
food, we need to give them respect," he added.
Gandhi alleged that BJP never talked about the issues of
the poor, including farmers and backward classes, in the
election campaign, but talked about terrorism.
"My father died. My grandmother died due to terrorism. We
know what terrorism is. Our people have died but we never
bowed before terrorists, nor will we ever bow before them," he
said in reference to release of terrorists during the Kandahar
hijack episode.
Bureau Report
