BHUBANESWAR: BJP national spokesperson and Rajya Sabha MP Sudhanshu Trivedi on Monday called Congress leader Rahul Gandhi a ‘kaamchor’, accusing him of avoiding hard work and making ‘false’ allegations of ‘vote theft’ to cover up his party’s electoral failures.
Addressing a press conference at the BJP state headquarters here, Trivedi challenged the Congress to name a single Assembly election since 2004 in which its leader had camped continuously in a state for a week or two to lead the campaign. In contrast, he cited BJP leaders such as Union Home minister Amit Shah, who he claimed, had spent more than 15 days at a stretch campaigning for West Bengal Assembly election. “Adat kaamchor ki aur nara vote chori ki,” Trivedi said.
Accusing Rahul Gandhi and the Congress of spreading misleading narratives about institutions and initiatives, including the SIR exercise, he said, the party had emerged as the greatest challenge to Indian democracy by creating confusion and distrust around constitutional institutions.
On the other hand, the BJP leader said, India continued to be the world’s fastest-growing major economy despite global uncertainties and geopolitical headwinds under Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s leadership. The proportion of India’s population living below the extreme poverty line has declined sharply from 27 per cent in 2011-12 to 2.6 per cent, he said.
Trivedi also said Odisha was emerging as an important growth engine in India’s development journey. He linked this potential to the vision of building a $500 billion economy by 2036 while the state government’s broader long-term roadmap envisages a $1.5-trillion economy by 2047. He identified advanced manufacturing, AI and indigenous defence production as key drivers of future economic growth and higher value addition.
Trivedi’s visit to Odisha is part of the BJP’s nationwide ‘Save Democracy, Remove Anarchy’ campaign, launched to counter the Congress’ allegations of vote theft and defend the electoral process and constitutional institutions. He led a padayatra in Cuttack from College Chhak to Dolamundai as part of the programme.
