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NDA trying to create two Indias: Rahul

Manas Dasgupta

— Photo: PTI

AICC general secretary Rahul Gandhi meets supporters during an election campaign in Dahod, Gujarat, on Tuesday.

MEHSANA (GUJARAT): All-India Congress Committee general secretary and youth leader Rahul Gandhi has accused the National Democratic Alliance of trying to create “Two Indias — one for the poor and the other India for the rich and affluent.”

Addressing a series of public meetings on Tuesday, the concluding day of campaigning for all the 26 parliamentary constituencies in Gujarat, Mr. Gandhi said that when in power the NDA not only totally “ignored” the “poor India,” it also felt “ashamed” of it and tried to “hide it from the world’s view.”

During the day, Mr. Gandhi addressed four meetings at Zankhvav in south Gujarat, Limdi (Dahod) in central Gujarat, Mehsana in north Gujarat and Surendranagar in the Saurashtra region.

Stressing that only the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance government “held the hands of aam aadmi [common man],” Mr. Gandhi recalled the recent visit to the country of a British Minister whom he had taken to Amethi, his constituency in Uttar Pradesh, to show the “real India.”

He said he was criticised by the NDA constituents for his “dramatics” — visiting villages, living and eating with the poor. He said he had no hesitation in taking the British Minister to Amethi. “I did it because he wanted to see the ‘real India’ and I told him that you cannot see it in Delhi; for that you will have to go to villages. I am not ashamed of the poor India, they are the country’s real strength and its future,” Mr Gandhi said.

He said it was the main reason for the NDA’s defeat in the last elections; the poor villagers could not relate themselves to the “India shining” campaign. India was “shining” only in the houses of the “rich and affluent.”

Without mentioning the BJP’s prime ministerial candidate, L.K. Advani’s name, Mr Gandhi asked what kind of a “strong leader” he was when he could not shoulder any responsibility as Union Home Minister and passed on the entire blame for the Kandahar episode to the then Prime Minister, Atal Behari Vajpayee. “Mr Vajpayee is no more in politics, so he cannot say anything about it, but what kind of a strong leader is this,” he asked.

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