The Home Minister also spoke about the Ram Temple.
Taking a dig at the Congress and Gandhi family, Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Thursday said that former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, grandmother of Rahul Gandhi gave slogans such as 'Garibi Hatao' but, in reality, the party never did anything for the poorer sections of society. He added that it was Prime Minister Narendra Modi who took care of 80 crore poor people in the country by giving them free ration.
Addressing an election rally in Sant Kabir Nagar, Amit Shah said, "They talk about the poor, Rahul Baba, your grandmother gave the slogan of eradicating poverty and you did nothing for the poor. PM Modi, the son of a poor tea seller, took care of 80 crore poor people in the country by giving free ration. Toilets were built in 12 crore houses, 4 crore pucca houses were constructed, Ujjwala gas cylinders were given to 10 crore mothers and sisters, pure tap water was provided to 14 crore houses."
Amit Shah said that the Congress wants to snatch the reservation given to Other Backward Classes and transfer it to the Muslim community.
"In Karnataka and Hyderabad, the Congress Party reduced the reservation for backward and extremely backward classes by giving 5 per cent reservation to Muslims," he said.
He further stated that this election is between those "who opened fire on Kar Sevaks in 1990 and those who constructed the Ram Temple".
"Samajwadi Party opened fire on Ram bhakts, hundreds of kar sevaks were gunned down. This election is between those who shoot at Ram bhakts and those who built Ram Mandir," he said.
Polling for the Lok Sabha seats in Uttar Pradesh is being held across all seven phases. Voting in the first five phases has already been completed, while the remaining phases are scheduled for May 25, and June 1. The counting of votes is on June 4.
In the 2019 polls, the BJP mopped up the bulk of the electoral spoils in the state, winning 62 of the 80 Lok Sabha seats, while ally Apna Dal (S) won two more seats. Mayawati's BSP managed to secure 10 seats, while her then-alliance partner, Akhilesh Yadav's Samajwadi Party, had to settle for just 5 seats. The Congress won just a lone seat in the state. In the 2014 elections, the BJP had swept UP, winning 71 seats, while the Congress could only bag two.
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