AHMEDABAD: Prime Minister Narendra Modi sounded the poll bugle in Gujarat — where polls are due later this year — by holding a mega road show and pitching for ‘politics of development’, to which he attributed the party’s latest electoral triumphs.
Addressing over one lakh panchayat representatives in Ahmedabad on Friday, Modi said the BJP managed to buck the trend of the party in power being rejected by voters because of its development works.
“Democracy has its own power. Just yesterday, thanks to that power of democracy, we were able to form government in four states where the party in power had never formed government for a second consecutive term in the past. Now, people have realised that in a democracy, development should be the priority of elected representatives,” the PM said at the Panchayat Mahasammelan.
Riding high on the poll success, the PM held a massive roadshow from the airport to the BJP office, with lakhs of workers and people cheering and greeting him along the 10-km route.
Later, the PM holds a meeting with state BJP leaders at the party office. Party sources said he shared the ‘Vijay mantra’ for the Gujarat elections and explained the formula of how the BJP won the four states of UP, Goa, Uttarakhand and Manipur.
At the panchayat conference, Modi invoked Mahatma Gandhi and stressed that villages need to be self-reliant and strong, for which panchayat representatives have to set goals for overall development.
“Gujarat is the land of Bapu (Mahatma Gandhi) and Sardar Patel. Bapu always talked about rural development, self-reliant and strong villages. Today, as we are marking ‘Azadi ka Amrit Mahotsav’, we must fulfill Bapu’s dream of rural development,” the PM said.
“More than 1.5 lakh elected public representatives sit together and discuss the bright future of Gujarat. There can be no greater opportunity than this, no greater power of democracy than this,” he said.
Modi asserted that the way to the Assembly passes through the gram panchayat, hence the responsibility of each sarpanch towards his/her village’s development increases.