‘Modimay loseVaranasi in ’19’
CONG SPEAK Rahul says a united Oppn could bring a BJP collapse in LS polls not seen in many years BENGALURU:Forget
the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) winning the 2019 general elections, even Prime Minister Narendra Modi might lose his Varanasi seat under a united Opposition, asserted Congress president Rahul Gandhi on Sunday.
Pegging his confidence on Opposition unity, Gandhi said far from the BJP winning the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, even Modi might lose from Varanasi if Congress, the Samajwadi Party (SP) and the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) unite against the BJP.
Exuding confidence over roping in and managing alliance partners despite their varied personal and regional aspirations, Gandhi predicted for the current ruling dispensation a “collapse” not “seen in many years.” “Frankly, I don’t see the BJP winning the next election, so in 2019 we will go back to the normal, I sense,” he said in response to a question on “Dalit anger”.
“...because there are two basic things, once Opposition unity goes above a certain level, it becomes impossible to win elections. Now the Opposition unity has gone to a point. It’s simple,” Gandhi said at an informal media interaction.
Pointing at the Opposition unity in Uttar Pradesh (SP, BSP), Bihar (RJD, Congress) and Tamil Nadu (DMK, Trinamool Congress, Nationalist Congress Party), he asked, “Where are they (BJP) going to win seats?”
“And in Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, Haryana, Punjab. We will take it over. You are going to see a collapse of the style you haven’t seen in many years,” he said.
Gandhi was on the sixth leg of campaigning as part of the ‘Janashirvada Yatre’ ahead of the May 12 assembly polls in Karnataka.
Responding to a question doubting the forging of Opposition alliance amid varied aspirations of each party and their leaders, Gandhi expressed confidence of overcoming it.
“We will manage it. We in the Congress know how to carry people, we are not egotistical people, we don’t crush people and we don’t destroy people’s lives, so we will manage it,” he said.
The basic thing is how to get the country out of the “mess that Mr Modi and RSS has put it in”, he said, and also ruled out the emergence of any “third front”.
Accusing the RSS of spreading anger and hatred in the country, Gandhi said that people are being killed for something they might have said and this needs to end. “The natural sort of political environment where there is a little bit of acrimony, but not hatred, needs to be restored.”
Stating that Modi had a “very good” opportunity after the 2014 election, Gandhi said a lot could have been done for the country.
He said Modi and BJP have lost track of how to run the country. “You can’t run this country as an individual, you have to run this country by listening to it, by working with it... and now after four years, he (Modi) has suddenly lost it, because now the wheels are running on them. Everybody can see that, you can hear it in his speeches,” he said.
While interacting with pourakarmikas (sanitation workers) in the city, Gandhi said if his party is voted to power at the Centre in 2019, he would learn from Karnataka on how to reward sanitation workers.
Chief minister Siddaramaiah, who was present, told him Karnataka has abolished the contractors hiring sanitation workers and enhanced their salaries from ~7,500 to ~18,000 per month.