Chhattisgarh Elections: Senior Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Saturday doubled down his attack on the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led central government alleging that the party and Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the party ‘work for two or three billionaires’ in India, pointing at recent reports of Adani Group’s alleged stock manipulation.
Addressing a convention of Rajiv Yuva Mitan Club at Mela Sthal in poll-bound Chhattisgarh’s Nava Raipur, Gandhi asserted that states governed by his party will have the “government of the poor” and not the “government of Adani”.
Rajiv Yuva Mitan is a scheme of the state’s sports and youth welfare department.
Referring to the reports by Financial Times, Gandhi said the article in the world’s biggest financial newspaper mentioned billionaire Gautam Adani sent ‘thousands of crores of rupees from India and swelled the share prices (of his own firms)’.
According to a report in London-based Financial Times, two individuals, one from the United Arab Emirates and the other from Taiwan, who used a Bermuda fund to amass and trade large positions in shares of the Adani Group companies, are associates of Vinod Adani, brother of Adani Group founder Gautam Adani.
The allegations from the report raise questions about the possible violation of Indian stock market rules.
“The PM should tell the people of Chhattisgarh and the country why he doesn’t want a probe against Adani.. I want to make it clear why he does not want a probe as it will cause harm to someone else, not Adani,” Gandhi said.
“Be it in Karnataka, Himachal Pradesh, Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh or upcoming governments of our party in Telangana and Madhya Pradesh, our government will be the government of the poor and not the government of Adani,” the senior Congress leader added.
Further, hitting out at the saffron party, Gandhi said that it only works with hatred and violence, and asserted that the Congress’ work is to open ‘mohabbat ki dukaan’ (shops of love) in the ‘nafrat ke bazaar’ (market of hate).
He also took a dig at the BJP, claiming that the party calls tribal communities ‘vanvasi’ instead of ‘Adivasi’ because it does not want them to come out of the forest and fulfil their dreams in various sectors.
“The true meaning of ‘tribal’ is the original inhabitants of this country, they are those who originally owned land, water and forests of the country. However, the BJP termed the tribals as ‘Vanvasi’, which implies that they should only be restricted to jungles,” Gandhi said.
“They gave new names to tribals, spread hatred and violence and incite clashes between two religions, castes and languages. On the contrary, Congress has resolved to spread only love wherever they have sown hatred,” he added.