Rahul says will build a new Cong to fight BJP

PLENARY We let people down, Gandhi tells party; hits out at ‘corrupt’ Modi govt

NEWDELHI: Positioning himself as Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s principal challenger in 2019, Rahul Gandhi on Sunday delivered one of his most aggressive speeches yet, with a promise to oust a “corrupt and powerdrunk” Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in the next Lok Sabha elections and build a new Congress with “talented youngsters”.

In his concluding speech during the 84th Congress plenary, Gandhi also admitted that the UPA government, led by the party, did not stand up to the expectations of the people in its final years.

“I don’t say it with happiness the people of this country felt let down by us,” the Congress president told his party colleagues, evoking thunderous applause and repeated slogans of “Rahul Gandhi zindabad” from the Congress workers gathered at Delhi’s Indira Gandhi Indoor Stadium. Likening the BJP and the RSS to the Kauravas from the Hindu epic Mahabharata, he said the Congress was humble like the Pandavas and fought for the truth.

“Centuries ago, there was a huge battle on the fields of Kurukshetra. The Kauravas were powerful and arrogant. The Pandavas were humble and fought for the truth. Like the Kauravas, BJP and RSS are designed to fight for power. Like the Pandavas, the Congress is designed to fight for the truth,” he said.

Gandhi alleged that the “corrupt and powerful today control conversation” in the country and the “name Modi symbolises the collusion between crony capitalists” and the prime minister. “Modi is not fighting corruption but is corruption himself,” he said. He hit out at the government over the Rafale deal and the failure to bring to book IPL chairman Lalit Modi and jeweller Nirav Modi, who are accused in different cases of alleged fraud.

The BJP was quick to hit back, saying the Congress, which questioned “fundamental existence of Lord Ram”, wanted to be identified with the Pandavas. Defence minister Nirmala Sitharaman described Gandhi’s address as the “rhetoric of a loser” and “devoid of substance”.