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Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi today said passage of Women’s Reservation Bill in Parliament would be the first thing his party would want to accomplish if voted back to power.
“Congress had tried to implement 33 per cent reservation to women in Parliament as it did earlier in the Panchayat Raj institutions. But the opposition parties have stalled our effort in Parliament. This time we will achieve it to channelise women’s power for the nation’s benefit,” he said while addressing his first-ever election rally at Mahabubnagar in the Telangana region.
He also promised the Congress party would introduce free medicines and healthcare besides providing pucca house for every poor family in the country.
“It is up to you to dream, either big or small. If you want to dream big, a dream to change your lives in the coming days vote for the Congress and bring the party back to power,” Rahu told the people.
Drawing a distinction between the two major national parties, he said while the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) sought to create two Indias - one for the rich and one for the poor, his party wanted to build a country where everybody was a rightful stake-holder in its future and development.
“We were not just confined to achieving the highest economic growth in the past ten years, we had also brought 150 million people out of poverty during the same period which never happened before,” Rahul said. While the peace and brotherhood among the people of the country was an essential prerequisite to take the country on the path of development, the BJP was seeking to create a rift between the Hindus and Muslims, he alleged.
On the job creation front, Rahul said his party would try and create as many industrial corridors across the country as possible so that young people of the new state of Telangana as well as India could make all those products that now carry ‘Made in China’ tag.
Takes on TRS
Rahul Gandhi minced no words in criticising the Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS), the main rival in the ongoing elections in this region, stating all that the TRS wants was power. He also said the TRS had no role either in conceiving the bifurcation Bill or in getting the enactment passed by Parliament, and the entire credit goes to his party and its president Sonia Gandhi to make the dream of Telangana people a reality.
“TRS is good at making promises but it will never bother to keep them. First TRS leaders said they will merge the party with the Congress if Telangana state was formed. But they did not do it.They had promised that they would make a Dalit the chief minister of the Telangana state. Now they had forgotten the promise. Take my word, the same fate is awaiting all those tall promises they have been making in this election,” he said while asking them to vote for the Congress if they wanted to build a great state of Telangana.
“The Congress party knows how to rule the country and how to rule a state besides how to bring development and social justice to the people. We deliver what we promise,” he said. Setting up of a 4,000 Mw power plant, declaration of two major irrigation projects of the region as national projects, and a 10-year tax holiday for new industries in the backward areas were some of the promises Rahul referred to in his speech.
