NewDelhi/Gujarat: In order to corner the ruling BJP in Gujarat,Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi on Friday asked Prime Minister Narendra Modi to explain why four private firms were favoured for purchasing power during 2002-16 in his home state.
Rahul Gandhi today took to Twitter and sought to know from the Modi-led BJP dispensation at the Centre the morale behind preferring the private firms for purchasing power.
This was his third question to PM Modi.
The young Congress leader has decided to ask one question daily to the Prime Minister in the run-up to the assembly elections in Gujarat. He has been attacking the Prime Minister over his development claims in the poll-bound Gujarat.
This was announced recently by Congress chief spokesperson Randeep Singh Surjewala who said that Rahul would ask a question to the Prime Minister every day.
“Rahul Gandhi is asking a question every day, why did misgovernance of 22 years create such a situation,” he had tweeted on Wednesday.
Rahul Gandhi had earlier asked the PM why should the people of Gujarat pay for the alleged misrule and financial mismanagement by the ruling BJP, citing a debt of Rs 37,000 crores one every Gujarati.
He said he would demand answers for 22 years of Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) rule in the state and the promises made to the people.
“First question to the Prime Minister on the state of affairs in Gujarat — In 2012, promises were made to provide 50 lakh new houses but built 4.72 lakh in five years. Will the Prime Minister tell, whether it will take another 45 years to fulfill the promise?” Gandhi posted on Twitter.
Congress spokesperson Deepender Singh Hooda said he hoped Modi and the BJP would answer Gandhi’s queries on “22 years of misgovernance” in Gujarat.
“We expect that the Prime Minister and the BJP to find some time and answer the questions asked to them by Rahul Gandhi,” he said.
“The BJP is working for the super rich and middlemen. The party’s (BJP) economic policy was at the cost of the poor,” he added.
Rahul Gandhi’s name was mired in a controversy recently over an alleged wrong entry in the register meant for non-Hindus at the famous of Somnath Temple in Gujarat.
A bitter war of words broke out between Congress and BJP after Rahul Gandhi’s name was entered in a register for “non-Hindus” during a visit to Somnath temple. Rahul Gandhi had visited the temple to seek Lord Shiva’s blessing, but the visit flared into a major row as he was put down as a “non-Hindu” along with Congress president Sonia Gandhi’s political secretary Ahmed Patel.
Non-Hindus are allowed into the Somnath temple but have to sign a register before doing so. BJP demanded Rahul specify his religious identity while Congress claimed it was a forgery.
Congress also accused the BJP of playing dirty politics and maintained he was a “devout Hindu”.
The controversy arose after Rahul Gandhi’s media coordinator Manoj Tyagi signed the register meant for non-Hindus, which the Congress claimed was manipulated later by adding the names of Rahul Gandhi and Ahmed Patel.
Moments after his visit, the social media was abuzz with pictures of a register showing the signature of Manoj Tyagi, with names of Gandhi and Patel on the left side.
The BJP went to town with the story that Rahul Gandhi has declared himself to be a non-Hindu.
“The Congress has always tried to project Rahul Gandhi as a Hindu. But the fact is that he is not. Rahul has visited over 20 temples of multiple Hindu deities since October. The Congress has been lying. The entry shows that he is not a Hindu,” said Raju Dhruv, BJP spokesperson in Saurashtra region.
Manoj Tyagi issued a statement that he had just signed the register in order to take media personnel inside the temple and not entered Rahul Gandhi or Ahmed Patel’s names. “These would have been added later,” he said in the statement.
Somnath temple, located on the shores of the Arabian sea on the southernmost part of Gujarat, is revered by Hindus and enshrines the first of 12 ‘jyotirlings’ of Lord Shiva. Through a notice in June 2015 the Shree Somnath Trust (SST) – the institution managing the temple – had made it mandatory for non-Hindus to seek permission of the Trust before entering the main temple.
Rahul Gandhi, later, clarified that his family is a ardent Shiva devotee and that they don’t discuss personal issues in public.
Bureau Report
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