Chandigarh, November 6
Haryana Chief Minister Nayab Singh Saini on Friday took a swipe at Congress leader Rahul Gandhi over his debate challenge, inviting him to Haryana to face questions from the BJP Yuva Morcha president. Offering to arrange the venue himself, the Chief Minister said Gandhi could not expect to make what he described as false allegations without facing questions in return. It cannot be a one-sided affair where someone makes false claims and then walks away, he remarked.
The Chief Minister said that if the Congress had any grievances regarding the electoral process, it should present its case before the Chief Election Commissioner. The Election Commission is an independent institution, and the doors of the courts are also open. He questioned why the Congress is unwilling to approach these forums, saying that merely making allegations from home for public consumption would serve no purpose.
Saini was interacting with mediapersons at Haryana Niwas on Friday after transferring funds under various government welfare schemes. He responded to questions on government initiatives, crop procurement, allegations levelled by the Congress and several other issues. Cabinet Minister Sh. Krishan Bedi, Chief Secretary Sh Anurag Rastogi and other senior officers were also present.
Launching a sharp attack on the Congress, the Chief Minister said the party had no substantive issue to take to the people and is therefore attempting to mislead the country in the name of “vote theft” while casting doubts on the credibility of democracy and the Election Commission. He said that if the Congress had complaints about voters’ names being deleted or incorrectly recorded, the Election Commission had already prescribed a procedure for raising objections. Electoral rolls had been made available in the public domain, and a month’s time had been provided for filing objections through the prescribed forms.
Despite these provisions, he said, the Congress continued to mislead the public. He said people were watching these developments closely and would no longer be swayed by such claims. There has been no vote theft. What the Congress is facing today is the consequence of its own actions. People are now even saying that the Congress should shut down the party, he remarked.
The Chief Minister said that during Congress rule, elderly people often went without pensions for as long as six months and were forced to make repeated visits to government offices and political leaders to secure their dues. Many, he said, had to wait outside offices in the scorching sun, with no one willing to listen to their grievances. He said Congress leaders were now raising allegations of vote theft but should first answer for the treatment meted out to the poor, elderly and needy during their tenure. He said that under the earlier system, when benefits worth Rs 200 were meant for a poor person, only Rs 50 would reach the intended recipient, with no accountability for the remaining Rs 150. Today, under the leadership of Prime Minister Sh. Narendra Modi, he said, the full amount of welfare benefits is being transferred directly into beneficiaries’ bank accounts.
The Chief Minister said the Congress had governed the country for decades and had been given opportunities by successive generations of voters. People had hoped that the next generation of Congress leadership would bring change, but the situation remained the same, he remarked. He further stated that the Congress lacked a concrete vision for national development even when it was in power and that its politics remained confined to allegations and counter-allegations. At times, its leaders staged protests wearing black clothes; at others, they sat on dharnas, and now they had begun turning to village chaupals, he said.
