Sending out a message of equality of religions, Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi today visited places of importance of all faiths and accused Prime Minister Narendra Modi of not paying heed to the problems of farmers.
Rahul, who arrived here on his 'Deoria to Dilli kisan yatra' during which he is raising issues related to farmers, visited the Cathedral church, Raidas temple, Nadva (Islamic seminary) as well as a gurdwara and paid obeisance.
He met the rector of Nadva and president of All India Muslim Personal Law Board and also prayed at the Cathedral besides interacting with students in the madrassa.
He also held a road show in the run-up to the upcoming Assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh covering major parts of the state capital.
Rahul atop a bus along with state party president Raj Babbar and Congress's chief ministerial candidate Sheila Dikshit held the road show, enthusing party workers and supporters.
As slogan shouting supporters greeted Rahul with flower petals, the roadshow converged at Chowk where he addressed the people telling them about the need for taking out the yatra.
"We have been forced to take out this yatra to highlight the plight of farmers... They are not getting the right price of their produce... Farmers are with us, this yatra will go up to Delhi where we will organise a meeting and tell Modiji what is in the heart of farmers," he said.
Promising that Congress will waive loans of farmers if it returns to power in the state, Rahul said that the Modi government has merely waived loans of big industrialists and so is not in a position to tell the people about it.
The Congress leader reiterated that his suggestion of bringing a 'kisan budget' will also benefit the central government.
He also recalled his agitation in Bhatta Parsaul in Uttar Pradesh and said attempts were made to snatch farmers' land there under the BJP government.
So far, Rahul has addressed 17 khat sabhas, 12 mega shows and over 500 public meetings during his yatra, a Congress leader said.
Gandhi also accused the Prime Minister of not listening
to the farmers and waiving their loans, but "waiving Rs 1.40 lakh crore in loans of 15 super rich people".
He also accused Modi of causing big damage to farmers and for "making fun" of their labour by stating they only dig holes. "Modiji! India's labourers don't dig holes, they build India and help the country stand up," he said.
He said under the NDA government, 1 per cent of Indians have 60 per cent of the wealth, but the other 99 per cent don't have black money.
The Congress leader said 94 per cent of the black money is in Swiss Bank accounts, and in the form of gold and land, and just 6 per cent is in cash.
"I don't know why Prime Minister Modi has made this 6 per cent black money his target and not the 94 per cent," he wondered.
Addressing the rally in the poll-bound state, he also alleged while Modi did not give Uttarakhand Rs 60,000 crore required for its development in the aftermath of the 2013 floods, he gave a "Rs 1,200-crore toffee to Vijay Mallya" instead.
"They say note ban is a surgical strike on corruption. But no, this is fire-bombing on India's poor," he said, adding "more people were killed in fire-bombing during WW-II than in Hiroshima".
He accused the Prime Minister of making the whole country stand in queues.
"By putting the one-time withdrawal limit at Rs 24,000, Modi's intention was to make your cash flow into your bank accounts and remain stuck there long enough to waive the loans taken by the 1 per cent super rich families," he said.
He said demonitisation was not a surgical strike on corruption and black money as projected by the prime minister and his ministers.
He said five per cent ofevery online transaction in a cashless economy willgo to "those 50 families".
He reiterated his charge of "crores of rupees" allegedly being paid to Modi by business houses on different occasions when he was Gujarat Chief Minister and asked him to reply to the charges.
