By IANS,
Amethi (Uttar Pradesh) : British Foreign Secretary David Miliband got a flavour of bucolic India – a thatched house and a rope cot to sleep in as cows and buffaloes grazed in the backyard — when he and Congress leader Rahul Gandhi spent Wednesday night at the home of Dalits in a village.
Both retired for the night after attending a non-formal panchayat in Semra village for about three-and-a-half hours. Milliband evinced keen interest in the problems of the farmers as Gandhi, who represents Amethi in the Lok Sabha, played interpreter.
Miliband went to the house of a Dalit woman Karma and slept on her cot. Gandhi went to an adjoining house of another Dalit, Shiv Kumari, and spent the night there after a spartan meal, a young Congress leader accompanying the two leaders said.
Both Gandhi and Miliband, who moved around with unobtrusive security, left for Munshiganj guesthouse early Thursday. Gandhi and Miliband reached Amethi Wednesday for a two-day visit.