Allahabad: Drawing a contrast between ‘scam-tainted’ UPA government and ‘unblemished’ NDA-led Centre, which completed two years in office, BJP chief Amit Shah on Tuesday said the party will ‘uproot’ the Samajwadi Party and BSP from Uttar Pradesh in the 2017 Assembly polls.
"Two days ago, Congress vice-president had addressed a rally and sought to know what the achievements of Modi government was after it recently completed its two years. Let me enumerate what this government has achieved, drawing a contrast with the decade-long period when his own party was in power," he said at a rally in Andawa, about 35 kms from here.
"You (Rahul) had put in the seat of power a 'mauni baba' (an apparent reference to former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh). We have given the country a PM who is ready to communicate on every important issue.
"While you (Congress) were in power, financial irregularities to the tune of lakhs of crores of rupees had come to light. Modi government is unblemished even after completing two years in office," he said.
The BJP president, who was addressing a 'Kisan Sammelan', stressed that the 2014 Lok Sabha election results had only "partially enabled" the party to reach the benefits of development to Uttar Pradesh.
The state had 20,000 villages with no electricity when our party assumed power in the country. In two years, we have electrified 8,000 of these and are confident of bringing power to the remaining ones by 2018, he said.
"However, many efforts of the Modi government are not yielding results because of non-cooperative attitude of the Akhilesh Yadav government. UP is lagging behind BJP-ruled states as, for more than a decade, power has been in the hands of either Mayawati's BSP which is known for rampant corruption or the SP which is notorious for patronising goons," Shah said.
"The BJP is acutely aware of the key contribution of the state in its resounding success in the last Lok Sabha polls. But for the 71 seats which we got from the state, we could not have got an absolute majority in the Parliament. I urge the people to uproot both SP and BSP when the state goes to polls early next year. This will enable us to complete our unfinished tasks in the state," he added.
Senior party leaders, including national secretary Siddharth Nath Singh, state unit president Keshav Prasad Maurya and a number of Lok Sabha members, were present in the rally.
BSP MLA Praveen Patel joined BJP at the farmers' rally.
Patel was the BSP MLA from Jhusi from 2007-2012 when the party was in power in the state. He unsuccessfully fought the 2012 Assembly polls from the newly carved out seat of Phulpur, since Jhusi was abolished after delimitation.
Patels have a sizeable population in the trans-Ganga region of Allahabad district.
Shah's visit to Allahabad was his first since becoming the party's national president two years ago. He is likely to spend the evening with party colleagues, taking stock of preparations for the party's national executive meeting scheduled for June 12-13 here.
The meeting is likely to be followed by a public rally of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
