Kickstarting his campaign for the upcoming Bihar Assembly polls, Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi on Wednesday jointly addressed a rally with the Mahagathbandhan’s chief ministerial face Tejashwi Yadav in the Sakra Assembly seat.
The two leaders trained guns on Bihar CM Nitish Kumar, whom they referred to as “remote controlled”. While Gandhi stuck to his usual points of social justice, caste census, vote chori and other local issues, Tejashwi touched upon his government jobs promise, and law and order in the state.
This was the first time in recent months that Gandhi directly attacked Nitish and his government. During his two-week Voter Adhikar Yatra in August, Gandhi had primarily focused on vote chori allegations.
Here are the key takeaways
‘Remote control’ CM
Both leaders referred to Nitish as a “mukhauta “mask” CM. “Nitishji’s face is being used while the remote control is with the BJP. You should not think that the voice of Extremely Backward Classes (EBC) is heard on that side. The BJP, along with three four others, controls everything,” Gandhi said.
Tejashwi said Nitish had aged and had been made the “mask of the NDA”. “My full sympathy is with him.. The government is being run by two-three people,” he added.
Direct attack on PM Modi
Slamming Modi several times during his address, Gandhi said the PM is desperate for votes and would “even dance on the stage” if someone asked him to.
“If you tell him to do a certain kind of drama for votes, he will do it. If you ask him to dance, he will do it. You should try. Ask him to dance instead of giving a speech and he will do it,” Gandhi said, accusing the Centre of “finishing small industries by taking decisions like the implementation of the Goods and Services Tax (GST) and demonetisation.
Rahul, Tejashwi bring up migration
Claiming that he finds youth of Bihar wherever he travels, Gandhi said they were being forced to migrate for work. “You built Delhi, you worked in Gujarat and helped in Mumbai. Forget Indian cities, Dubai was built because of your hard work. Why can’t you do the same in Bihar?” Gandhi asked.
On the other hand, Tejashwi said if given a chance, by the next Chhat Puja, people would not need to migrate from the state for work. “We will build a Bihar from which people will not need to migrate. Women suffer the most as someone’s son goes, someone’s husband,” he said.
‘Two Indias’
Claiming that the Centre was building “two Indias”, Gandhi spoke of the Chhat Puja in Delhi. “One India is for Modiji for him to do his drama of Chhat Puja, where there is a video camera and clean water. Just 10 yards away is the truth of India, where there is dirty water and disease. It was seen on TV. While Modi will bathe in clean water while India will bathe in dirty water. Every Indian saw this,” he said.
Mentioning industrialist Mukesh Ambani to slam Modi on his recent cheap data comment, Gandhi said: “You gave data at cheap rates… Who is making money? Not the youth of Bihar. It is the owner of Jio. Then, you are lying to the youth of Bihar. You gave Ambaniji the spectrum for India. You did everything for Jio.”
Gandhi also brought up the Dharavi Development project of Maharashtra. “Why don’t you say that land worth lakhs of crores where Biharis stay – Dharavi – you gave it to (industrialist) Gautam Adani. Why don’t you tell them that you gave land for Re 1 after snatching it from the farmers of Bihar? Why don’t you tell them that the Land Acquisition Bill brought by the Congress and Rahul Gandhi was finished by you,” he said.
Reiterating allegations
Gandhi alleged that the BJP had “stolen elections” in Maharashtra and Haryana, and that they “will make every effort to not let a government of Bihar’s voice be formed”.
He promised that the INDIA bloc will “form a government of every section, caste, and religion”. “We will not leave anyone behind – whether it is EBC, OBC, Dalit, minorities or general castes… Our focus will be on education and it will be our attempt to give you the best university of India in five years,” said Gandhi.
Speaking about the caste census, Gandhi said that in Parliament, he had said that he should get a caste census done and that the PM was silent on the issue. “He didn’t utter a word. Look at education, bureaucracy, healthcare. The BJP and Narendra Modi are against social justice. I told him that the caste census will be done and everyone will know their share of the population,” he added.