Motihari (Bihar): Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday sounded the poll bugle in Bihar, where assembly elections are due shortly, calling for “an NDA government, once again”, which would protect the state from the “evil intentions” of the RJD-Congress combine.
Modi also accused the RJD of seizing land from the poor on the false promise of jobs, in an apparent reference to the ‘land-for-jobs’ scam, and asserted that the ‘viksit’ (developed) Bihar is key for eastern India’s development.
Addressing a rally in Motihari town, the headquarters of East Champaran district, he said, “The people of the state had broken the shackles of RJD”, but the younger generation “must be made aware of the despair in which Bihar was mired two decades ago”.
He also made an indirect reference to the land for jobs scam, on a day when the Supreme Court turned down a plea by RJD supremo Lalu Prasad, a former railway minister and the prime accused, for a stay on trial.
“Employment generation could have never taken place in Bihar under people who made aspirants part with their land in the name of providing jobs,” said the PM.
In contrast, he pointed out, “lakhs of youths in Bihar” have got loans under the Mudra Yojana promoting self-employment, and his government has also launched other schemes like Rs 15,000 assistance to youth getting their first jobs in the private sector.
“The scheme will be rolled out on August 1 and the Centre will be bearing an expenditure of Rs one lakh crore for the same,” said Modi.
He also raised slogans in Hindi, roughly translating “we will build a new Bihar with the NDA in power once again” and “the resolve of Bihar is unshaken, to remain with the NDA always”.
Modi alleged that under the RJD-Congress rule, the poor could not afford pucca houses and the relatively better off “feared getting their homes whitewashed or distempered, as this could attract the attention of marauding gangs involved in kidnapping for ransom”.
In contrast, he said, over the past 11 years, “four crore houses have been built across the country under the PM Awas Yojana, of which 50 lakh are in Bihar. This figure surpasses the total population of countries like Norway, New Zealand and Singapore”.
“In Motihari alone, the around three lakh families have got pucca houses and the figure continues to grow. Today, more than 12,000 families have got keys to their new houses and 40,000 families have received funds in their bank accounts to build pucca houses”, said the PM, whose speech was preceded by launch of development projects worth more than Rs 7,000 crore.
He also pointed out that the poorest of the poor now had access to banking services thanks to the Jan Dhan scheme launched by his government, in sharp contrast to earlier times, “when our mothers and sisters were forced to keep their savings hidden in some obscure corner of their homes”.
Modi charged the Congress-RJD combine with “arrogance that leaves no respectable space for leaders who do not belong to families that control these parties”.
The allusion may have been to Independent MP Rajiv Ranjan alias Pappu Yadav, an INDIA bloc supporter, and young Congress leader Kanhaiya Kumar, both of whom were shoved aside last week while trying to climb atop a vehicle from where Rahul Gandhi and Tejashwi Yadav were addressing the public in Patna.
The PM also said that the Congress-RJD combine, while in power, had “put brakes on development”, but “we salute the resolve of the people of the state who broke the shackles” in the 2005 assembly polls, which brought the NDA to power for the first time.
He, however, added that “the younger generation must be made aware of the despair in which Bihar was mired (nirasha ke gart mein duba) until two decades ago” and that it was essential to “protect Bihar against the evil intentions (buri niyat) of the Congress-RJD combine”.
The PM also touched upon the success of Operation Sindoor, which followed his announcement, from Madhubani district in the state, that the culprits of Pahalgam terror attack will be taken to task.
“This is a new India, which spares no effort in punishing the enemies, mobilizing forces from both land and sky”, remarked Modi, who also reaffirmed his government’s commitment to stamp out naxalism, and claimed that efforts made in the direction have “benefited Bihar districts like Aurangabad, Gaya and Jamui, once held back by Maoist violence”.
He shared with the people his vision for a developed Bihar, “where Motihari gets as much prominence in the east, as Mumbai has in the west, opportunities in Gayaji are at par with those in Gurugram and industrial growth in Patna matches that of Pune”.
Modi also accused the previous Congress-led UPA government at the Centre of “political retaliation” against the Nitish Kumar administration in the state “which received a meagre assistance of Rs two lakh crore over a period of 10 years”.
“Since 2014, when we took over, Bihar has been provided Rs nine lakh in central assistance”, disclosed the Prime Minister.
Besides the Bihar CM, who is a key NDA partner, the PM shared the stage with Governor Arif Mohammed Khan, besides Union ministers belonging to the state, including Chirag Paswan, Jitan Ram Manjhi, Rajiv Ranjan Singh alias Lalan, Nityanand Rai and Ramnath Thakur.
