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In Amethi, Yogi targets SP more than Congress
Yogi, in his nearly half-an-hour speech made a reference to the Congress only twice or thrice while targeting the SP and the BSP consistently, even as he highlighted the achievements of his government in the past five years.
Chief minister Yogi Adityanath on Wednesday addressed an election meeting at Tiloi, in Amethi, and flayed the Samajwadi Party more than the Congress, while avoiding making much reference to the grand old party there.
Amethi was considered to be the Nehru-Gandhi family’s bastion till the 2019 Lok Sabha elections when Congress leader Rahul Gandhi lost the seat to (union minister) Smriti Irani.
Yogi, in his nearly half-an-hour speech made a reference to the Congress only twice or thrice while targeting the SP and the BSP consistently, even as he highlighted the achievements of his government in the past five years.
Although Yogi mentioned about his public address in neighbouring Rae Bareli a few days back, the Lok Sabha constituency of Congress president Sonia Gandhi, he avoided making a reference about the Congress and said he had asked SP chief Akhilesh Yadav to clarify his stand on the terror issue, there.
“Nine of those convicted for the Ahmedabad blasts are from Uttar Pradesh. Seven of them are from Azamgarh and one of them is son of a Samajwadi Partys functionary. At Rae Bareli, I had asked the SP chief to clarify his stand on the accusations that the SP is patronising terrorists,” the CM said.
Did Yogi do this tactically, or did he deliver his address in the perspective of rest of the state? The BJP and the SP-led alliance are being seen as having straight contests on most of the seats of state and Yogi, apparently, did not want to bring the grand old party in focus on the latter’s turf. Both Rahul and Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra visited Amethi in December 2021 in their bid to renew links with the people there and make a beginning to reclaim the family’s bastion.
Yogi said the efforts of local BJP leaders, including the MLA and the MP (union minister Smriti Irani) have resulted in setting up of a medical college at Tiloi, Amethi. He said the foundation stone of the new medical college has been laid and the same would be ready by 2023 and local youths would get an opportunity to study medical science there.
He informed the people how the double engine government of BJP was distributing ration free to the poor. He said the same was not possible during the tenure of SP and BSP governments. As BJP’s Tiloi candidate Mayankeshwar Sharan Singh was not present on the dais, Yogi used the occasion to clarify that Singh was away following directives of the election commission. The EC had asked Singh to stay away from campaigning for 24 hours and this period would end on Thursday morning.
