Jaipur: Congress today accused the NDA government at Centre of disappointing people by not fulfilling the promises the party made during elections and claimed that it was just following the programmes of former UPA government.
“BJP leaders during elections criticised the schemes and programmes of UPA government... and tried to defame the UPA government. But now what the Modi government is doing... the government is just adopting our programmes,” Gurudas Kamat, AICC general secretary and in charge of the party affairs in Rajasthan, here said.
He alleged that the saffron party misled the people by making false promises to them to come to power. “Despite so many works done by the UPA government at the Centre and by the Ashok Gehlot government in Rajasthan, we had to face defeat. It was a conspiracy by the BJP which misled people and made false promises to them to come to the power,” he said.
Kamat, while addressing the party leaders and workers, also targeted former CAG Vinod Rai over his estimate of loss of Rs 1.76 lakh crore to exchequer during the UPA government and said he might be given some post by the (NDA) government.
“BJP gave post-retirement job to former CAG T N Chaturvedi who was made the Rajya Sabha member and later Governor. Vinod Rai has also been retired and now it will come to know that what he is going to be in coming days,” he said. Kamat said Congress has put up a good show in the recently held bypolls and won three out of four seats in Rajasthan. “Vote percentage of ruling BJP in Gujarat also came down on seats from where Prime Minister Narendra Modi used to be elected,” the Congress leader said.
The Party's victory on three seats in Rajasthan was encouraging and could be possible as all leaders of the party, except some, were together and made hard efforts, Kamat said.
“I would not say that all leaders were united. There are some leaders who are compelled to do something as per their habits and they did in the bypolls too, but most of the leaders and workers, almost 99 per cent, were united and could make the victory possible,” he said without naming anyone. Former chief minister Ashok Gehlot, while addressing the meet, alleged that “Narendra Modi made false promises and created hype during electioneering and made people believe that inflation will come down and black money will returned to India after he becomes Prime Minister”.
“People have now seen what was the truth in promises made by Modi and other leaders. Modi has disappointed people. Results of the bypolls show that BJP has lost faith and confidence among people,” Gehlot said.
He said law and order situation was deteriorating in the state but the government was doing nothing except of damaging the schemes and programmes introduced by the former government.
“Robbers raped a woman in front of her husband and robbed the family. Incidents of chain snatching and other crimes are rising. This is a serious matter and there is resentment among people,” Gehlot said.
The government is damaging the schemes like free medicines and pensions which was started by the former government and its impact is seen in the bypoll results, he said. PCC president Sachin Pilot said that the government misused government machinery in each Assembly constituency to ensure victory but the voters showed them mirror.
“Usually, a party which is in power wins bypolls but the history has changed in Rajasthan where Congress won three out of four seats. On fourth seat also, the vote percentage of BJP also came down,” he said.
Pilot said “voters chose us despite the fact that the BJP is going to rule the state for the next four years. This shows that the BJP has lost ground.”
Newly-elected three MLAs of the party—Shrawan Kumar, Bhajan Lal and Ramnarayan were felicitated on the occasion. Before the felicitation programme, the party leaders also flagged off trucks carrying relief material for flood victims in Jammu and Kashmir.
Senior party leaders except former ministers C P Joshi and Girija Vyas were preset on the occasion.