Union Minister Jairam Ramesh on Wednesday categorically stated that a vote for the Congress was one for development, progress, social empowerment and to keep the secular fabric of the largest democracy in the world, together.
Accompanied by AICC’s SC Cell Chairman and former bureaucrat Koppula Raju, the sitting MP Anjan Kumar Yadav (Secunderabad) and MLA Danam Nagender (Khairatabad), both of whom are seeking re-election, he addressed a half-a-dozen meetings in the Lok Sabha constituency limits, including Assembly segments of Secunderabad, Musheerabad and Khairatabad, throughout the day.
All the public meetings were well-attended and Mr. Ramesh and Mr. Raju sought to drive home the point that it was the Congress that had facilitated the fructification of a six decade-old dream, that of carving the separate State of Telangana and spoke of welfare measures initiated by the Congress in free India over the years.
Mr. Ramesh, Mr. Nagender and Mr. Anjan Kumar Yadav played to the gallery, pointing out how the Congress had always strived to improve the lot of the downtrodden, the weaker sections including the Backward Classes, Scheduled Castes and Tribes and the minorities. A vote for the Congress was one for development and secularism, they said, reiterating that a vote for the BJP would surely rip to shreds the already torn secular fabric of the nation.
