MYSURU, NEW DELHI: All India Congress Committee (AICC) president Rahul Gandhi on Saturday asserted that people should support his party for many reasons that aims at building a ‘fair India’ rather than building the country with the ideas imposed by others.
Interacting with students at Government Maharani’s Science College here, Gandhi while reacting to a particular poser from Rani, a student, said: “People should choose the Congress over the BJP, as the former wants to bring communities together against the BJP’s ploy of adopting divisive tactics. The Congress believes in ‘ahimsa and non-violence.”
The Gandhi scion who took a range of questions beginning from demonetisation to Goods and Services Tax (GST), Lokpal Bill to unemployment, Doklam issue to industrial sector spoke with ease, frequently striking a chord with youngsters, asking them to address him as ‘Rahul than calling him ‘sir’.
To a query on demonetisation raised by Aisha Maria, Gandhi said: “It should never have been done as the purpose for which it was claimed to be implemented has hit a dead end. If it was really aimed at checking black money, then how could a scam like that of Nirav Modi tumble out. Most of the black money is stashed either in the form of gold, real estate or in Swiss banks.”
Strangely, the DeMo was announced without taking competent authorities like the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) into confidence as its chief was unaware of such a big step along with the chief economic advisor to the prime minister.
“When I spoke to former prime minister Manmohan Singh and former finance minister P Chidambaram, they were equally appalled and Chidambaram bursted out with laughter”, said Gandhi dismissing it as a bad idea.
SM Krishna to play key role
For the high stake upcoming Karnataka Assembly elections, BJP chief Amit Shah is eying scores of State Congress leaders with aims to wean them away in coming weeks. The BJP chief is also learnt to have slotted former Union Minister S M Krishna for key campaign roles in the state polls.
In a key strategy meeting last week, which was presided over by Shah and attended by Union Ministers Prakash Javdekar and Piyush Goyal, besides the state party in-charge P Muralidhar Rao and party’s chief ministerial candidate B S Yedyurappa, sources said that the saffron outfit would seek to wean away key state Congress leaders with an aim to weaken the morale of the incumbent CM Siddaramaiah.
Within the BJP, Karnataka polls is being seen as a high stake election, which will set the trend for crucial Assembly battles in Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chattisgarh later this year. “The BJP chief is holding regular meetings on Karnataka polls. The state poll is being seen tough on the basis of internal assessments, which suggest a close finish. The incumbent chief minister Siddaramaiah is being taken as the principal roadblock for the BJP from wresting the southern state in its kitty,” sources said, while adding that the BJP would be throwing its doors ajar for a lot of formidable state Congress leaders to swing the outcome,” sources close to the BJP chief said.