As dark clouds hovered over the ITI Ground here on Friday afternoon threatening to spoil the show, Congress president Sonia Gandhi branded the Bharatiya Janata Party communal and cautioned the people not to vote for it in the ongoing polls.
“The country will suffer, and we all will also suffer if the BJP is voted to power,” Ms. Gandhi warned. “The BJP was bereft of any principle and commitment, and its only agenda was to divide the people on communal lines,” Ms. Gandhi said, addressing a massive rally seeking support for her party nominees contesting the Lok Sabha and Assembly polls in Odisha.
While reiterating that BJP’s sole aim was to capture power, Ms. Gandhi claimed that Congress was the only party that always made an effort to keep all the people united across the country.
Taking a dig at BJP’s prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi who addressed a rally in the town a few hours before her and alleged that Congress only remembered the poor before polls, Ms. Gandhi said Congress always worked for inclusive growth and benefit of the tribal people and weaker sections.
Lamenting that Odisha had remained poor despite having rich mineral resources, Ms. Gandhi criticised the Biju Janata Dal government for not implementing the Right to Food law and provision for payment of bonus to farmers. As many as 4,000 farmers had committed suicide under the BJD rule, she alleged.
