Cong announces 5 guarantees for J&K
Fayaz Bukhari
SRINAGAR, Sept 11: Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge today criticised Prime Minister Narendra Modi saying that he has failed to deliver in the last 10 years.
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Addressing a press conference, Kharge launched a scathing attack on Modi, saying that whatever developmental initiatives that were launched by him have collapsed or are leaking.
“The BJP has not done anything in the last 10 years, where ever a bridge was inaugurated, that bridge collapsed. Ram Mandir was inaugurated; the roof is leaking now. Wherever PM Modi inaugurates anything, this has happened. People say his touch is pure, but I don’t know what touch he has. Not only that, wherever there is a flood, there is no money for flood relief. This is the situation of the nation,” he added.
The Congress chief said that the BJP has to answer to the people about changing a State to a Union Territory and whether that move has benefited the people of the region.
“I have never seen in my political life of 60 years that a State has been converted into a Union Territory, have you all heard of this before? So, the BJP has to answer whether they have pushed Jammu and Kashmir forward or pulled it backwards,” he said.
Kharge targeted BJP for making false promises on Jammu and Kashmir. “The BJP has said that the region is bustling with crowds, the crowds are of security forces, half of them wear their dress, the other half are without their dress, so the BJP keeps saying that we have developed Kashmir so much, but these are all false promises that they have made. But this is their habit, they have said this before too,” he said.
“People think that since it is just a state election, it is not that important, that is not the case. Just as important was the Parliamentary election, so is this Assembly election,” he added.
The Congress president further condemned the BJP for failing to provide jobs to the people of J&K.
“When people asked about unemployment, they told the people that they would give 2 crore jobs every year, give 15 lakh to every household, these are all election ‘jhumlas’. Today also they are saying they will give 5 lakh jobs, but how will they give the jobs, there are 1 lakh government job posts vacant right now, so why haven’t they given those yet? They don’t have that answer. Just not here, all over India, there are 30-35 lakh job posts vacant. There is unemployment here, and on top of it things are getting more expensive,” he said.
Earlier, Kharge while addressing a rally at Anantnag announced five guarantees for the people of J&K, including five lakh interest-free loan for women entrepreneurs and Rs 25 lakh health insurance per family, if the Congress-NC alliance is voted to power in the Union territory.
The Congress chief said the Congress-NC Government will give Rs 3,000 monthly to the women heads of families besides promising to restore the provision to give 11kg grains per person through the public distribution system.
He said the promise for rehabilitation of Kashmiri Pandit migrants, which was made during the term of Manmohan Singh, will be fulfilled.
The OBCs will also get their rights as enshrined in the Constitution, he added.
The five guarantees were read out by the Congress president in presence of National Conference president Farooq Abdullah and other senior Congress leaders, including K C Venugopal and Subodh Kant.
Kharge said there were one lakh jobs vacancies in Jammu and Kashmir but the current dispensation appointed by the BJP-led Centre is not filling them as “they want to keep people of Jammu and Kashmir poor”.
“We will fill these vacancies. They did not bring any industry, hence no job creation. We will focus on tourism and manufacturing. More than 4,400 Government schools have been closed in the past several years. We will reopen them as we will focus on education,” the Congress president said.
Kharge reiterated that the party will strive for restoration of Statehood to Jammu and Kashmir while promising to restore a bi-cameral Legislature in the Union Territory.
“We will strive to get Statehood for J-K. The bi-cameral House will be restored. They (BJP) keep asking how we will do it? When people are with us, we will do it as it is people’s power,” he added.
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