New Delhi: Hitting the campaign trail for the Delhi Assembly polls, Congress General Secretary Priyanka Gandhi on Tuesday slammed the Narendra Modi-led Central government over the rising unemployment rate in the country, which is the highest in the last 45 years, and asked if it is a “co-incidence or an experiment”.
She also did not spare the ruling Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and targeted Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal for doing nothing for the national capital despite being in power for the past five years.
Addressing a public meeting in south Delhi’s Sangam Vihar for Congress candidate Poonam Azad, Priyanka Gandhi expressed the party’s concern over the faltering economy and raised the issue of employment.
Citing a recent report that had pointed out that combined employment in seven sectors had fallen by 3.5 crore, Priyanka trained her gun at the Prime Minister.
“Can he (Modi) clarify if the job cut is an experiment or a coincidence? That the unemployment rate is highest in 45 years is a coincidence or an experiment,” asked Priyanka Gandhi, who is the party’s in-charge for eastern Uttar Pradesh.
Slamming the Prime Minister, she said, “Modiji says the opposition does not allow him to work. But still he is working at a rapid pace. The government companies are being sold at a high pace such as Air India, LIC, BPCL, BSNL and even the Railways is being sold. True, their (government’s) pace is fast.”
She also did not spare Union Home Minister Amit Shah. Targeting the BJP government over the law and order situation in Uttar Pradesh, Priyanka Gandhi said, “The Home Minister came to campaign here and said that we will make Delhi like Uttar Pradesh. As the Congress in-charge for UP, I can tell you that under the BJP rule, the state has become even more miserable. The unemployment rate in UP is the highest in India and every two minutes a woman gets raped, every 90 minutes, atrocity against children are reported, every day 30 Dalits are trargetted. Also, maximum cases of murders are reported from UP.”
Targeting the AAP government in Delhi, she said, “They (AAP) claim that we have worked in the education sector, but the classrooms and the universities were made during the Congress rule. During the Congress rule, hospitals were made and when the AAP government came, they promised to build five hospitals. But they did not do so. The Congress increased 22,000 beds in government hospitals. But during AAP’s five-year rule, only 3,000 beds were added.”
The 70-member Delhi Aseembly goes to the polls on February 8, while the results will be declared on February 11.
The Congress, which ruled the city for 15 years from 1998 to 2013, was reduced to nil in the 2015 Assembly polls, while the AAP managed to win 67 seats and the BJP bagged three seats.
