Asserting that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is not only a political party but also an ideology and a movement fired with a resolution of making a new India, BJP national president Amit Shah on Saturday said that just as Swami Vivekananda had enhanced the glory of India when the country was under the British rule, Prime Minister Narendra Modi was doing the same at present.
Shah kicked off the campaign in Varanasi in preparation for the 2019 lok Sabha polls. Incidentally, the campaign came at the backdrop of party launching its millennium voters' campaign in which young BJP volunteers called 'vistaraks' would start a door-to-door campaign and enrol youths completing 18 years of age on January 1, 2018, and ask them to cast their votes in the next election.
Addressing an impressive gathering of youths at Yuva Udghosh programme held at Mahatma Gandhi Kashi Vidyapeeth (MGKV), Shah said PM Modi had brought name and fame on the global platform.
"The BJP is the largest party in the world with 11 crore members and now the party is in power on about 80 per cent land of the nation with power in 19 states," claimed Shah, adding that the BJP was not a caste-based party and rather it was a party of workers where a simple worker could be its national president and a tea seller could become the PM.
All praise for the state government, Shah said that the UP had witnessed a big change in just 10 months after Yogi Adityanath assumed the charge as CM. He stressed farmers were elated as the money was going into their bank accounts directly without the interference of middlemen. He added that about a year ago the UP was at the top as far as the crime graph was concerned but at present the state's number had come down to the bottom with improvement in law and order situation.
"The state is galloping fast on the road to progress providing 15 to 24 hours power to rural and urban areas without interruption whereas the interruption was a regular feature during the regime of previous government," he said and hoped that the UP would at the top on the development front when the party would go for parliamentary election in 2019.
Shah claimed that the government at the Centre had done a lot for the development of the nation making domestic gas available to women in crores, making available electricity in almost all villages, constructing toilets in crores for social security of women. He added that the Union government had also brought a bill against triple talaq for the social security of women without any political intention.
Earlier, Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath said that the glory of India had touched an all-time high under the leadership of Modi. The CM claimed of fulfilling promises made in Sankalp Patra during election as his government had so far provided houses to 11 lakh poor people and jobs to unemployed youths in lakhs through skill development programme and various recruitments.
Party state chief Mahenedra Nath Pandey also expressed his views on the occasion. The CM handed over logo of Kumbh Mela to party chief. Ministers belonging to the city, party MlAs and other public representatives of district and senior office-bearers of party state unit were mainly present on the stage with party chief and the CM.