‘WE HAD LOST ALL HOPE TILL RAHUL TOOK UP OUR CAUSE’
AMETHI: Kathaura village, where Congress vice-president held a chaupal with farmers on Wednesday, has an old connection with the party.
It was at this village that the party called a convention, expecting to turn its fortunes till a storm forced the party to defer the meet in the early 1990s.
Nearly 25 years later, villagers kept talking about whether the Amethi MP’s visit will improve their lot.
Though he assured farmers he would continue to fight for them and shop owners, some villagers remained apprehensive as the Congress is not in power even at the Centre now.
“I remember the Congress proposed to hold a convention in our village to discuss a strategy to improve its fortunes (in the early 1990s). We hope Rahul’s visit will turn our fortunes,” said a villager.
Mohammad Zahid, who runs a tea shop near the venue of Rahul Gandhi’s ‘chaupal’ in Kathaura, said: “Our homes and shops have been demolished by the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI). We had lost all hopes till Rahul Gandhi took up the issue with the NHAI in Lucknow on August 1.”
Haji Mohammad Khan, another resident, recollected how the late Rajiv Gandhi had brought industry to Jagdishpur and how successive governments failed to keep the promises made to the villagers here.
“Yes, late Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi worked hard and brought industry to the Jagdishpur industrial area. Out of about 250 small industrial units set up in Jagdishpur, only 20 to 30 are working now. Others have closed down over the years,” said Haji Mohammad Khan. “Even Rahul Gandhi worked and brought a number of projects. See, even the closed steel factory taken over by Steel Authority of India (SAIL) is not working now,” he said. His sentiments were echoed by the Congress leaders who spoke at the ‘chaupal’ before Rahul Gandhi’s address.
Most of them blamed the BJP for shifting projects out of Amethi. Rahul referred to the Shaktiman Food Park projects that was scrapped after the BJP came to power at the Centre in 2014.