Addressing a public meeting in Amethi, which is one of the seven Lok Sabha seats, that NDA failed to win in the 2014 Lok Sabha polls
Even as Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi was campaigning in poll-bound Gujarat, the BJP took the battle to Gandhi family bastion Amethi, attacking him and his family for having done nothing for the development of the area.
Addressing a public meeting in Amethi, which is one of the seven Lok Sabha seats, that NDA failed to win in the 2014 Lok Sabha polls, BJP president Amit Shah said, "Rahul baba cannot see development as he sports Italian spectacles... He is mocking at the development in Gujarat. I want to ask 'Shahzada' of the Congress as to what your three generations have given to Amethi. You sought account of our past three years but people of Amethi are taking account of works done here by your past three generations."
Replying to Gandhi's repeated poser as to what the BJP had done, Shah said, "We have given a prime minister who speaks," an indirect attack on the reticent former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.
Shah, who addressed the gathering flanked by Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath and Union Minister for Information and Broadcasting Smriti Irani, who was the runner-up in the last Lok Sabha polls from Amethi, told the gathering, "You have trusted a family for 60 years, now trust BJP and (Prime Minister Narendra) Modi and you will not feel betrayed."
Gandhi had secured 4,08,651 votes against Irani's 3,00,748.Though Irani lost to the Congress vice president in Amethi, she managed to reduce his victory margin from around 3.70 lakh in 2009 to 1.07 lakh in 2014.
Answering Gandhi's criticism of BJP's model of development, Shah said in remarks laced with sarcasm that there are two models of development here -- a 'Nehru-Gandhi model' and a 'Modi model'.
"Congress ruled the country for 70 years. I want to ask you that you have been MP here for a long time but why is there no collector's office, TB hospital and Akashwani's FM here. Erosion of land due to Gomti river has not been stopped," he said, and counterpointed it by naming schemes launched by Modi government and reeling out figures of projects undertaken in last three years.
"For the first time in 35-40 years, I am seeing that the winning candidate remains missing from his constituency and a defeated candidate is giving time for the people," Shah said, hailing the work being done in the area by Irani.
In her address, Irani alleged that Rahul, who talks about relief to farmers, hadn't returned their land taken by the Rajiv Gandhi Foundation here. "If Rahul is hearing me today I want to say that you used to talk about development in the country and abroad. You make a mockery of development in Gujarat. The country was surprised that the Rajiv Gandhi Foundation (RGF), headed by Rahul, which did not do any commercial activities has purchased it. The land should be freed and given back to the farmers," Irani said.
The Union Minister had created ripples in 2015 when she accused the top Congress leadership of usurping nearly 65 acres of land acquired from farmers for setting up a manufacturing unit, Samrat Cycle, a project that never materialised.
She recalled that during the 2014 polls, when she had gone to a village which had been boycotting elections, she was told by the villagers that they were doing so because they could not meet their leader. "Then I told them that Rahul might not have time, but I will be available for you and requested the village head to vote," she said.
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