Rahul Gandhi with Virbhadra Singh.

Rahul names 6-time CM Virbhadara to lead Himachal campaign for 7th time

Generational shift in Congress leadership soon; prepare for 2019: Khurshid

Agency Report | Mandi (Himachal Pradesh)/Shillong | 7 October, 2017 | 11:50 PM

The Congress for once seems very decisive about its Himachal plans with Rahul Gandhi making it clear that the party was going with its strongman Virbhadra Singh despite all the cases of corruption against him as he is the only man under whom the party can put up a credible fight against the BJP.

Ending speculations over the party’s chief ministerial candidate in Himachal Pradesh, Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi on Saturday said Virbhadra Singh will “become the Chief Minister for the seventh time”.

Clearing indicating that the party stands behind Virbhadra Singh, who is facing cases of disproportionate property and is out on bail, he said: “Virbhadra Singh ji has done tremendous development as six-time Chief Minister. He will be the CM for the seventh time. This will have the full backing of the party.”

Officially launching the election campaign at a public meeting here, Gandhi, in his 15-minute address in Hindi, compared the development of this hill state ruled by the Congress with that of BJP-ruled Gujarat. Both are likely to go to the assembly polls simultaneously in November.

“The people of Himachal should compare the five-year tenure of Virbhadra Singh’s government with that of the BJP government in Gujarat.

“In Himachal Pradesh, not even a single government school is closed, whereas the Gujarat government has closed 13,000 government schools.

“Himachal Pradesh has opened four medical colleges in the past five years, whereas Gujarat has not opened even one,” he said.

Noting that Congress-ruled Himachal Pradesh has provided government employment to approximately 70,000 youth and is providing an unemployment allowance of Rs 1,000 per month, he said that the Gujarat government in the past five years provided less than 10,000 government jobs and not even providing unemployment allowance.

Taking a jibe at Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Gandhi said the central government had hurriedly implemented the Goods and Services Tax, which was initially initiated by the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance and has resulted in job losses.

“In Gujarat alone, 30 lakh young men and women have lost their jobs due to GST,” he said.

There is a competition with China and China provides jobs to 50,000 youths every day whereas the Modi government gives jobs to 450 youths.”

He said instead of one tax throughout the country, the central government has imposed five different types of taxes, completely derailing the economy with the imposition of 28 percent tax from the very onset. “This is the biggest blow to the Indian economy.”

In the BJP-ruled states thousands of farmers committed suicides every day. “Neither they (the BJP governments) give bonus nor did they help them. But they give only speeches,” he said.

The Congress leader, who earlier visited the state on December 24 last year to address a public meeting to mark the completion of four years of the state government led by Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh, blamed the Central government for the GDP decline.

“The fall in GDP by 2 per cent speaks volumes about mismanagement of the economic reforms,” he added.

Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh credited the development of the state to the Gandhi family, right from Jawaharlal Nehru to Rajiv Gandhi.

On laying the foundation of a Rs 1,350 crore 750-bed AIIMS hospital in Bilaspur town by the Prime Minister on October 3, he said the government has provided land to AIIMS as demanded by the Union Health Ministry.

“I want to make it clear that it is the responsibility of the central government to provide state share for undertaking development and the funds provided for AIIMS is not from anyone’s pocket. It is the funds from Bharat Sarkar (Indian government) from the share of the states,” he added.
Meanwhile, amid reports that Rahul Gandhi was set to take over the party leadership, Congress leader Salman Khurshid on Saturday said there will be a generational shift in the party soon.

“I personally don’t think we should speculate why he is not coming, when will he come… I can say that it is now objectively clear that the generational change in leadership is now on the anvil. It will happen,” Khurshid told journalists here in Meghalaya.

“Some of us think we need to put this new structure in place well before the next Lok Sabha election. We are all hopeful that he should take this decision and announce it. I hope it happens soon,” the former central minister said.

Noting that Rahul Gandhi was already part of the triumvirate – Congress President Sonia Gandhi, former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and (Rahul) as Vice President, Khurshid said: “He (Rahul) has something in his mind. I think he is working on a plan. As and when he makes up his mind and discloses his plans to us, we will be there to support him.”

Admitting that since the 2014 Lok Sabha election the Congress had not been able to show any spectacular success, Khurshid said: “An objective coordination between the opposition parties is necessary for us to take on the BJP.”

He also accused the Modi government of adopting double standards while dealing with the Rohingya refugee crisis.

“On the one hand you are giving citizenship (to some) and on the other, you are not even giving temporary place to stay before they can go back when things turn to normal,” he said.

“It is certainly a very narrow-minded attitude of the government,” he said.

“We have always supported refugees. During the Tibet crisis, Tibetans came here, when the Afghan crisis happened, Afghans came here, during the Sri Lanka crisis, Tamils came here. And we kept them for many many years,” he said. (IANS)