Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi speaks to the media in Chandigarh on Wednesday before leaving Punjab
Before he left Punjab today and headed to Maharashtra for a "padyatra", Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi took another swipe at Prime Minister Narendra Modi, this time on his make in India initiative.
''The PM talks of make in India but the farmers of Punjab are the true make in India," Mr Gandhi said in Chandigarh. The 44-year-old Congress vice president had recently described PM Modi's government as a "suit-boot government," accusing it of "favouring big industrialists at the cost of the poor farmer."
Since his return from a 56-day sabbatical abroad earlier this month, Mr Gandhi has cast himself as the champion of farmers in distress, attacking the Centre on what he calls its "anti-farmer" land reforms and traveling to different places in the country to meet farmers.
On Tuesday, Mr Gandhi boarded the general compartment of a train to Punjab on an unscheduled visit to the state's grain markets, where farmers are protesting against slow purchase of their produce. He now goes to Maharashtra's Vidarbha region, where he will trek 15 km in a padyatra designed to highlight farmers' woes tomorrow.
He will walk through villages in the Amravati division, which has seen the most farmer suicides in the region last year, said the Congress.
"My effort is that wherever farmers are facing difficulties, I should raise their voice," said Mr Gandhi today.
"He is a good photo opportunist," said the BJP's Nalin Kohli, dismissing the Vidarbha trip as yet another tour by Mr Gandhi, whose party has aggressively tweeted pictures of his travels and interactions with people, including those on the Sachkhand Express yesterday.
Widely tipped to take over as Congress president from his mother Sonia Gandhi soon, Rahul is seen as trying rebuild to his party after it was decimated by the BJP in the national elections last year. The defeat in May was followed by several others in state elections.
His focus on farmers is seen as an attempt to consolidate the support of 67 per cent of the country's population. At a time when farmers across the country are struggling with damage to crop from unseasonal rain, the Congress leader has tried to focus rural anger on the Centre by targeting it on its land bill, which makes it easier to acquire land for industrial projects.