By Sharat Pradhan, IANS,
Sitapur (Uttar Pradesh) : Launching her Bahujan Samaj Party’s (BSP) election campaign Wednesday, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati attacked the Congress, blaming it for anything that she could not deliver to the people during her five-year rule over India’s most populous state.
Even as she did not spare the Samajwadi Party or the Bharatiya Janata Party from her attacks, it was the Congress that remained her key target throughout the 50-minute-long speech that she read out from a printed text before a large crowd in Sitapur, about 85 km from Lucknow.
With Congress general secretary Rahul Gandhi having campaigned in the area Tuesday, Mayawati did not miss the opportunity to run him down.
Claiming that her rally drew at least five times the crowd that was addressed by Gandhi, she sought to warn the people: “Don’t get carried away by the lip service of different opposition parties and their manifestos, but be particularly wary of the Congress party, because it has very big stakes but a very poor support base.”
In an obvious reference to Gandhi, she remarked: “A top Congress leader has been repeatedly lamenting over the fact that a lot of people from UP go begging for jobs in far-off places, but I would like to ask him what his party did to prevent this migration during the 40 years that Congress ruled over this state.”
Terming the Congress as grossly “anti-Dalit”, Mayawati charged the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance government of personally targeting her as well as her government through misuse of institutions like the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) and the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG).
Citing the current probe into the Rs.5,000-crore National Rural Health Mission (NRHM) scandal, which also involves murder of three senior health officials, she said: “The manner in which the probe is being carried out clearly reflects the anti-Dalit mindset of the Congress party which has clearly influenced the CBI and CAG to target me.”
“The Congress cannot tolerate the daughter of a Dalit as chief minister and that was why its effort was to run me down.”
She also charged the Congress-led central government with not giving adequate assistance for development of the state.
Talking to reporters, Mayawati said her government had done more work in the past five years than any other government in the state since the country became independent and asserted that only her BSP can ensure progress of all communities.
“There is need to ensure progress of all communities. Only BSP can ensure that people from all communities are on their feet,” Mayawati said.
Asked if she would continue to be chief minister after the elections, Mayawati said the question should be put to people who have to elect a new government.
“You can judge seeing the crowds,” she said.