Modi flags Cong’s fake pledges, citing Kharge’s advice to party

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday launched a frontal attack on the Congress cautioning voters against the principal opposition party’s “sponsored culture of fake promises” and noting that the “Congress stood badly exposed”.

Modi’s rare broadside came after Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge lectured state units of the party in fiscal prudence, asking them not to bite off more than they could chew and also to make only those promises that can be aligned with available budgets.

“I advised Maharashtra Congress leaders not to keep making seven, eight guarantees, and instead make promises that align with the budget. Making promises without factoring finances could lead to bankruptcy... If the government fails, it could impact future generations,” Kharge said.

The Congress chief was speaking in Bengaluru where he publicly ticked off state Deputy CM DK Shivakumar for suggesting a review of “Shakti”, one of the five guarantees Congress gave during the Karnataka elections which it won. The scheme involves an offer of free rides to women in non-luxury government buses.

‘poll Guarantees not fulfilled’

The Cong’s ‘guarantees’ lie unfulfilled, which is a terrible deceit upon the people of the states it rules. —Narendra Modi, Prime Minister

Modi, speaking on the eve of Maharashtra and Jharkhand elections, cited the Haryana mandate to argue that voters wanted development and not fake guarantees. The incumbent BJP just bagged a historic hat trick in Haryana, where the Congress had made several poll guarantees.

“The people of the country will have to be vigilant against the Congress-sponsored culture of fake promises. We saw recently how the people of Haryana rejected their lies and preferred a government that is stable, progress-oriented and action-driven,” Modi said, while the ruling BJP demanded an apology from both Kharge and Congress leader Rahul Gandhi for a series of unfulfilled promises. The PM went on to say there was growing realisation across India that a “vote for Congress is a vote for non-governance, poor economics and unparalleled loot.” “The people of India want development and progress, not the same old fake promises of Congress,” he said. Giving examples to back his point, Modi said in Karnataka, the Congress was “busier in intra-party politics and loot instead of even bothering to deliver on development”.

“Not only that, they are also going to rollback existing schemes. In Himachal Pradesh, salaries of government workers are not being paid on time. In Telangana, farmers are waiting for the waiver they had been promised. Previously, in Chhattisgarh and Rajasthan, they promised certain allowances which were never implemented for five years,” the PM said.

There were numerous examples of how the Congress worked. “The Congress is realising the hard way that making unreal promises is easy but implementing them properly is tough or impossible,” he said.

“Now, they stand badly exposed in front of the people,” he said, as the BJP stepped up its campaign for the November 20 Maharashtra elections and the two-phased Jharkhand poll on November 13 and 20.

Kharge, for his part, spoke publicly in Karnataka about the five guarantees the Congress made to the voters of the state and rapped Shivakumar for suggesting review of a major promise.

Earlier today, BJP leader Ravi Shankar Prasad took a dig at Rahul Gandhi’s poll-time remarks about “khat-khat transfer of money to different population groups” and demanded an apology from him.

Prasad said, “In Himachal, Congress ministers were asked not to draw salaries, and even a toilet tax was introduced and then withdrawn. In Karnataka, they are reviewing a guarantee. Unlike Congress, BJP makes promises that are fiscally prudent. We are not like them (Congress). Late PM Indira Gandhi gave ‘garibi hatao’ slogan in 1971, but that was never realised,” said Prasad, with the BJP set to make Kharge’s remarks on guarantees a major election plank.

In Jharkhand, the BJP-led NDA alliance is pitted against the ruling incumbent INDIA coalition of JMM, Congress, RJD and Left Front.

In Maharashtra, too, two coalition blocks are facing off in a major battle — ruling Mahayuti (BJP, Shiv Sena and NCP) and opposition Maha Vikas Aghadi (Congress, Shiv Sena Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray and NCP Sharadchandra Pawar).

This is the first Assembly election after vertical splits in two major regional players of Maharashtra — the NCP and Shiv Sena. In the recently held General Election, the NDA lost significantly at the hands of the Maha Vikas Aghadi partners. The BJP itself was down from 23 seats (of 48) in the 2019 Lok Sabha poll to just nine.

Meanwhile, in a response to Modi's comments, Kharge accused the government of indulging in "cheap PR stunts". He also questioned the government's assertion of taking input from over two million people for a 2047 roadmap, noting that a Right to Information (RTI) query to the PMO failed to provide details to substantiate the claim. Kharge said "B" and “J” in BJP stood for “Betrayal” and “Jumla”.