In a bid to reclaim his party’s lost ground in Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s home-State, All India Congress Committee (AICC) vice-president Rahul Gandhi kick-start ed his poll campaign for the party from tribal Dediyapada village of tribal dominated Narmada district in South Gujarat with optimism to win over 100 seats out of 182 in the forthcoming Assembly elections on the state’s foundation day.
AICC vice-president made it a point to offer prayer to tribal deity at Dev Mogra village around 23 km from the venue of his public meeting near Dediyapada. Expressing confidence to win the Gujarat assembly polls, the Nehru-Gandhi scion said that his party would fight the assembly polls with all its might to ensure BJP’s defeat.
Raking up the Patidar issue, Gandhi said that the community leaders had recently met him over their children not getting education as the system was controlled by handful people connected with the ruling party. Buoyed by the presence of large number of attendees at the rally, he took dig at the Prime Minister, saying that Gujarat was currently being ruled by no more than 10-15 people and that in “Vibrant Gujarat”, nobody except those people (close to Modi) have got real benefits.
In his approximately 20-minute speech, Rahul tried to reach out to the tribal communities by saying that if Congress came to power it would see that the first right on Jal (water), Jungle (forests) and Jameen (land) would be with the tribal people and not those ruling or dominating the state. He also trained guns on Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) along with BJP saying that they do not respect tribal people and they want tribal people to go to bigger cities to serve those who are already living there. Congress party would never allow this and protect your (tribal) rights on water, forest and land,” he added.
Continuing attack on PM Modi, he claimed that the Prime Minister had promised jobs to two crore youngsters, but his government could able to create hardly a lakh jobs last year. “He (Modi) wants people to hear his ‘Man ki Baat’. When Congress would come to power, we will hear ‘Man ki Baat’ of people. Our philosophy is not limited to one person who would bring development. We want you (people) to contribute in development,” he said.
Tribal belt of Gujarat is extremely important for political parties contesting assembly polls as of the 182 seats, 27 seats are reserved for the Scheduled Tribes in the state. Hence just a fortnight ago PM Modi to hold a huge rally in neighbouring Tapi district to woo tribal population which is more than 15 per cent of Gujarat’s population. At the rally newly appointed Gujarat in-charge and former Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot, senior Congress leader and AICC president Sonia Gandhi’s political adviser Ahmed Patel, leader of Opposition in Gujarat Assembly Shankersinh Vaghela, Gujarat Pradesh Congress Committee (GPCC) president Bharatsinh Solanki among others shared the dais with Rahul Gandhi.