Bhubaneshwar: Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge and stalwart Rahul Gandhi on Friday accused the BJP of making attempts to “steal (chori) the elections in Bihar, as it did in Maharashtra” last year.
Addressing the party’s ‘Samvidhan Bachao Samavesh’ here, the Congress leaders also accused the Election Commission of India (ECI) of not doing its duty but working for the interest of the BJP.
“We will prevent the BJP and ECI from stealing the elections in Bihar,” Gandhi said.
The Congress has been alleging that the manipulation of the voters’ list helped a BJP-led alliance win the Maharashtra assembly polls in 2024.
Gandhi alleged that Odisha’s new BJP government is run by industrialist Gautam Adani, for whom, the leader of the opposition in Lok Sabha claimed, the Rath Yatra in Puri was halted.
He also wooed the party’s grassroots workers, saying: “You are ‘Babbar Sher’ (lions), do not fear anyone and fight for justice.”
At closed-door meetings after the public meeting, the party top brass, in a message to the Odisha leaders, said that they must shun infighting and work in tandem to unseat the BJP.
Attacking the saffron party, Gandhi said at the rally: “Like Maharashtra, attempts are being made to steal the elections in Bihar. The BJP is attacking our Constitution across the country… At a meeting yesterday, the INDIA bloc decided to prevent the BJP and ECI from stealing the elections in Bihar.”
The assembly polls in Bihar are due later this year.
Kharge, in his speech, called the Maharashtra administration a “Chori government”.
Gandhi alleged that the BJP runs the government for capitalists and not the common people.
“Nowhere in the Constitution it is written that the country belongs to Adani, Ambani or billionaires only, but the present government is doing everything for 5-6 capitalists at the cost of common people,” he said.
Gandhi alleged that Lord Jagannath’s Rath Yatra in Puri was also halted for “Adani and his family”.
This indicates the influence of Adani on the Odisha government, he claimed.
Odisha’s Law Minister Prithiviraj Harichandan, however, denied that Lord Jagannath’s chariots were halted for Adani’s visit.
“Rahul Gandhi’s allegation is inconsequential,” he said.
Gandhi met farmers, women and others in the state and listened to their plights before addressing the public meeting.
“On one side are Odisha’s poor people – Dalits, tribals, backward classes, the weak, farmers, and labourers. On the other, there are five-six billionaires and the BJP government. The Congress party workers, together with the people of Odisha, can win this battle,” Gandhi said.
He said ‘Jal, Jangal, Jamin’ belong to the tribals and will remain for them.
Gandhi also claimed that Odisha’s BJP government has “not implemented” the Panchayats (Extension to Scheduled Areas) Act, 1996 and handed over tribal land to corporates.
Both Kharge and Gandhi asserted that the Congress government had implemented the forest rights act and PESA, but the BJP government is giving land, forest and water to corporates.
The party will enforce these laws and ensure that tribals get their land, they said.
“Whoever the government is attacking, oppressing, Congress will fight for them, I will stand by them,” Gandhi said.
Both Kharge and Gandhi also voiced serious concerns over women’s safety in Odisha, they said over 40,000 women have gone missing from the state, and their whereabouts are unknwon.
Kharge said that the Congress MPs will raise the issue of Gopalpur gang rape and other incidents in the upcoming session of Parliament.
Gandhi said the caste-based census was a success in Congress-ruled Telangana and it is required in Odisha.
The census will determine the exact population distribution across communities and understand their social and economic status, he said.
The AICC president alleged that the BJP-led central government was attempting to omit secularism and socialism from the Constitution, and weakening legislations meant to protect the poor and tribals.
“The saffron party has a mission to change the Constitution,” he asserted.
Kharge also accused BJP supporters of attacking Dalits and government officers in Odisha.
Hitting out at the Centre, he also said that the Congress governments set up 160 PSUs, while the BJP government sold 23 of them.
“(Prime Minister) Narendra Modi ji is selling public assets created by the Congress to his selected friends. He has only one agenda – to destroy the Constitution,” Kharge alleged.
The Congress president listed the party’s contribution towards development of Odisha and the BJP government’s “tall claims”.
Kharge ridiculed Modi over his “silence” on US President Donald Trump’s claims of brokering a ceasefire between India and Pakistan’s military conflict.
Trump made such statements 16 times, claiming that he has asked India for a ceasefire, But the PM remained silent because he does not have the guts to speak against the US President, he asserted.
“We will not consider him a leader who doesn’t have the power to protect his own country,” Kharge said.
