Cong ignored villages: Modi in Guj

SURAT: The Congress will have to leave divisive and vote bank politics if it wants to win the trust of the people, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said on Monday as campaigning heated up in the closing stages of the assembly elections.

Addressing four rallies across the state, Modi said the opposition party practised appeasement politics and hailed the BJP for developing villages, which he said previous governments neglected.

“If the Congress party wants to win the trust of the people of Gujarat, they have to give up their highly divisive politics, colours of communal riots and casteism, and vote bank politics.

Those who want to divide the country up can no longer count on getting support and trust from the people of Gujarat or India,” Modi said at an election rally in Palitana. “Illiteracy, malnutrition, these had become the misfortune of the villages of Gujarat. But when Gujarat trusted the BJP, things started changing. The BJP made safe and secure Gujarat its priority,” he said.→p8