WARANGAL: Prime Minister Narendra Modi: “Ab Telangana ke aakanksha mein kya hai? (Now, what is on Telangana’s wish list?)”
Crowd and BJP leaders on dais: “Ab ki baar, BJP sarkar! (This time around, BJP rule!)”
With these words, Modi launched the BJP’s election campaign for the Assembly elections in Telangana at a massive public meeting on Saturday in Warangal, leaving no doubt that the target was the BRS and the “KCR family”, both of which, he indicated, “have it coming.”
Focusing on the major campaign plank of the BJP leaders and cadre in the state, the corruption charges against the BRS government and its leaders, Modi declared: “Every project in Telangana is tainted with corruption charge. KCR government means the most corrupt government. Look at their game, their corruption has now spread to Delhi,” in an apparent reference to the Delhi liquor scam and the alleged role of BRS MLC K. Kavitha in it.
In a statement that could set off a fresh round of serious concern among the BRS rank and file, Modi said: “Rest assured, investigating agencies are probing all these charges. The family in power here is involved in corruption running into hundreds of crores of rupees.”
“It is unfortunate that the Telangana all of you fought for, and sacrificed so much, today has to face this situation. The truth is now before the people. This is the first time a state government is facing such charges,” he said.
Modi, who prefaced his address with a declaration that he was speaking as a ‘BJP Karyakarta’, warned the people that both the BRS and the Congress “are fatal for Telangana” before he laid into the two parties.
Declaring both parties as family-run, Modi said: “Congress and BRS are steeped in corruption and they must be defeated. The ruling family here is trying to misdirect and divert the attention of people from these charges. People must be beware of such actions.”
Modi said, “Every time I come to Telangana, I come face to face with your concern, that you never thought you would be caught in the grip of such a family rule where only that family’s children benefit. It is not their concern that the futures of your children, your sons and daughters are being destroyed.”
To grab the public attention and capture their imagination, Modi started off his speech in Telugu, saying: “Jai Maa Bhadrakali, Bhadrakali Ammavari mahatyaniki, Sammakka Saralamma paurushaniki, Rani Rudrama parakramaniki prakhyati ganjina Warangal ku ravadam santosham ga undi (invoking the deities, says it is his utmost pleasure to visit Warangal.)”
Calling the crowd of BJP supporters a representation of Telangana, he said: “This support will now make the ruling K. Chandrashekar Rao family in Hyderabad lose its sleep. Today, your strong presence here makes the message clear. In the Assembly elections, BJP will win and the BRS and Congress will be wiped out.”
Modi said that when the BJP had just two members in the Lok Sabha in 1984, one of them, Chandupatla Janga Reddy, was elected from Hanamkonda (the other MP was A.K. Patel from Mehsana, Gujarat). “Warangal has been a strong fort of the BJP since the time of Jan Sangh. Today, the BJP is the world’s largest political party. Telangana had a huge role in making this happen. The BJP government at the Centre has increased the standing of India in the world and Telangana is benefitting from this stature by getting investments. The question is — what has the BRS government done for the state?” he asked.
Modi then proceeded to answer the question he posed.
First, he said, what the BRS government does every day from morning to evening is to abuse Modi and the Centre, and it uses the entire dictionary to do so.
Second, Modi said, one family has made itself the centre of power, behaving like the sole owner of Telangana.
Third is that the family destroyed the economy of the state and its financial well-being.
And fourth, Modi said, it drowned Telangana in corruption.
“So many of you placed your hopes on them, but every hope has been broken. This government in Telangana knows too well that it in the last nine years, it cheated people. The last nine years are littered with one scam after another,” he said.
“We kept out promises. But beware of those who make false promises before elections. If BJP says it will give free ration, it ensures it reaches the beneficiary families, just as it has ensured Rs 5 lakh medicare under Ayushman Bharat, a toilet for every house and drinking water through piped connection to homes,” he said.
The Centre has spent Rs 55,000 crore on MNREGA in the state, deposited Rs 9,000 crore in 40 lakh farmers’ accounts under the Kisan Samman Nidhi and infused Rs 1,000 crore into the rural economy through the PM Awas Yojana, he said.
Modi said that although Telangana has completed just nine years, the contributions of its people have been significant in making India the fifth-largest economy in the world. The BJP government, he said, believes that no part of India should be left behind in the fast-paced development, and recounted how the Centre worked over the past nine years to improve the state’s infrastructure and connectivity.
Congratulating the people on the launch of new projects worth more than Rs 6,000 crore on Saturday, Modi said Telangana’s highway network doubled from 2,500 km to 5,000 km since 2014.
Several transport corridors that are part of Bharat Mala — the Hyderabad-Indore, Chennai-Surat, and the Hyderabad-Panji economic corridors, as well as the Hyderabad-Visakhapatnam inter corridor — pass through the state. Telangana, he said, “is connecting the surrounding economic centers and becoming a hub of economic activity.”
On the railway goods wagon manufacturing unit at Kazipet, the foundation stone of which he laid earlier in the day, Modi said that Kazipet will become part of the new energy of ‘Make in India’. “New employment opportunities will be created in this area and every family will be benefited in one way or the other,” he said.
