Shah slams SP, Cong at BJP's booth-level workers' meet

Shah said the image of Uttar Pradesh has taken a beating due to the recent Jawahar bagh incident

Hitting out at the ruling Samajwadi Party in Uttar Pradesh over alleged migration of Hindus from Kairana, BJP president Amit Shah said it was the duty of the state government to maintain law and order.

"Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav has said migration in Kairana has happened due to poor law and order situation. Is (Barack) Obama responsible for law and order in Uttar Pradesh?" he told a conference of booth-level workers of the party in western Uttar Pradesh here.

Referring to Mathura's Jawahar Bagh incident where violent clashes between police and illegal encroachers left 29 people dead earlier this month, Shah said the image of Uttar Pradesh has taken a beating.

He blamed the SP government for not allowing the benefits of Centre's welfare schemes to reach the common people. "They (SP) are not allowing the benefits to reach the common people of Uttar Pradesh because of the fear that the credit would go to the (Narendra) Modi government," he added.

In a speech that lasted for about half-an-hour, Shah said if any party could defeat SP in Uttar Pradesh, it was BJP, adding that the party would contest the 2017 Assembly polls in the state banking solely on its cadre.

Reminding the party workers that he too had started his political journey as a booth president, the BJP chief said no one can rise from the post of booth president to party president in Congress.

"To rise up to the party president's post in Congress, one needs to be born into the Gandhi family," Shah said, adding that the scenario is similar in SP and BSP too. "(SP chief) Mulayam Singh Yadav's grandson can become the state president in SP but not a booth president," he alleged.

Responding to Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi's barb as to what the BJP government at the Centre has done in the last two years, Shah said his party has given the nation a Prime Minister who "can talk". During former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's tenure, the country eagerly waited for 10 years only to "hear his voice", he said.

"Besides, in the last two years, there has not been a single allegation of corruption against the government whereas Congress had left behind a legacy of scams worth Rs 12 lakh crore," he said, adding that the party has perpetrated scams "on earth, underneath it, in sky, in universe, on sea."

Maintaining that his party has given the country a "decisive" government, the BJP chief said during the Congress rule, every minister considered himself and not Manmohan Singh the Prime Minister.