It was not a simple election. Around two months that I spent working on the ground in Gujarat, I always felt the that the soul of AamAadmi Party (AAP) has come to lodge itself in the body of Congress. The entire campaign of Congress in Gujarat was deluged with lies, divisive politics and undeliverable promises made by the Congress and her three crutches of caste cowboys – HAJ (Hardik Patel, AlpeshThakore and JigneshMewani).
Our suspicion of AAP’s soul in Congress’ body first came from lies and baseless allegations made by HAJ. This was confirmed by two incidents – firstly, the shocking satisfaction expressed by HAJ on unconstitutional and unachievable promises of Congress on quota and secondly, AAP’s absence in the election campaign? Until a few months before AAP was challenging Prime Minister NarendraModi for election in his home state but as the elections came close they surrendered.
For records AAP contested on 29 seats but I could not see even a single popular leader of AAP visiting Gujarat during elections. Even AAP’s Gujarat ConvenorGopalRai was not seen there. Nobody knows where all of them disappeared suddenly? Was this done on the directions of Congress? AAP is considered a media friendly party but hardly any AAP candidate got media coverage in this elections. Who was managing all this?
Like AAP Chief ArvindKejriwal, the HAJ along with Rahul Gandhi used the tool of spreading falsehood throughout the election campaign. The allegations that ‘Modiji eats mushrooms of Rs 80,000 per piece to become fair’ by AlpeshThakore and ‘Modiji gave 48,000 crore acre land (more than three times of land on entire earth) to industrialists’ by Rahul Gandhi; were the height of lies.
Congress scion and his caste cowboys kept on changing their data of unemployment in Gujarat from 50 lakh to 30 lakh.
In reality, Gujarat generates highest employment in India and unemployment is lowest in the state. As Minister for Labour and Employment in Manmohan Singh government, MallikarjunKhadge (now Leader of Opposition in LokSabha) had conferred a certificate on Gujarat government for being at the top in providing maximum jobs among 35 states and union territories.
The Congress has created a psyche among the youth that employment means ‘government job’ therefore many people who are working in private sector or unorganized sector or self employed have registered themselves in the unemployment register for government job. In the Gujarat Model of development, BJP in the leadership of the NaredraModi has succeeded in changing the ‘government job is only job’ mentality by empowering youths through a host of initiatives like Start Up, Make in India, and industrialization etc.
Similar lies were spread about petrol prices and CNG by ArvindKejriwal in Delhi assembly elections. In Delhi Kejriwal used some unfortunate incidents on churches to project BJP as anti-Christian and in Gujarat Congress used an heinous incident to brand BJP as anti-Dalit.
In Delhi AAP had promised CCTV and security guards at prime places and buses for women security, wifi for youths throughout the city, loan for students, new colleges, new hospitals, new busses, free water and free electricity for all, and loan for students among others. In Gujarat Congress promised 5% reservation for Patels above 50% cap, subsidized education, and unemployment dole among others. In how many states, Congress had provided unemployed dole so far? Will Congress provide unemployment dole in Karnataka and Punjab?
Why Congress did not promise unemployment dole in Bihar where unemployment is very high and became a reason of migration. In Gujarat, they promised expenditure of around Rs 1.10 core for a state which has revenue of Rs 70,000 crore.
I have a simple question to the political analysts who are busy in projecting ‘brand new’ Congress under the sixth party president from Nehru dynasty. How casteism become ‘brand new’? The same Congress solicited some backward castes with 10% reservation in 1980s but excluded Patels from this benefit. This led to massive caste and communal violence in which 100 people lost their lives.
Who was the unlimited beneficiary? The Congress achieved maximum 149 out of 182 seats. In 80s Congress had KHAM (Khastriya, Harijan, Adivasi and Muslims) in 2017 they have HAJ. In every election Congress implements its divisive theory – divide Hindus in caste and consolidate Muslims on religion. In Gujarat, Congress was so confident on the second part of her theory that they did not utter even a single word for Muslims and focused their entire energy on fanning casteism and spreading hatred.
The Grand Old Party first excluded Patels from reservation to be in power but in 2017 promised them reservation to come back in power. They killed 100 people for KHAM and around 10 lost their lives for HAJ. It was due to this model of divisive politics, Congress’ top leaders ShaktisinhGohil and ArjunModhvadia lost elections.
The Gujarat election was unique in the sense that in the leadership of Prime Minister NarendraModi we were fighting all the divisive forces in one go. They include – Congress, Casteism, Communalism, NGOs, Cheer Leader Politicians, academicians turned part time salaried politicians from campus of universities like JNU, student leaders across campuses, and journalist turned part time politicians. It was Modivs all. The people of Gujarat have voted for Modi and his model of development.
(The writer is a senior BJP activist and former Leader of House, South delhi Municipal Corporation)