"Congress Seeks Vote On Retirement, JDS On Survival": PM Modi In Karnataka

Attacking Congress and Janata Dal-Secular (JDS) ahead of Karnataka assembly polls, Prime Minister Narendra Modi today said Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is asking for votes for development while Congress is seeking votes in the name of retirement and JDS to ensure the political existence of its family.

Addressing a public meeting at Sindhanur, PM Modi said, "BJP is the only party which has the road map of development. The double engine has the resolve and the power."

He said the only goal and resolution of the BJP is to make Karnataka, the no 1 State in the country. Only the double-engine government of the BJP can ensure true development.

"Interestingly, BJP is asking for votes in order to bring development in Karnataka and Congress is asking for votes in the name of retirement. JDS, on the other hand, is asking for votes to ensure the political existence of its family," PM Modi said.

He said, "The biggest cheating, Congress and JDS governments have done is with the villages of Karnataka, the farmers of Karnataka. Right since the independence, Congress had been looting the country, had been blocking the ways furnishing development to the villages of the country."

Every BJP worker, PM said has stood like a rock in front of the "appeasement politics" of Congress and JDS.

He said, "Congress-JDS never paid attention to the real needy due to appeasement policy. The problems of Lingayat, Banjara, Lambani Samaj and Kurba community were also pending for years. For the first time, the BJP government gave the identity of villages to their settlements. Hakku patra were given to thousands of Banjara families. This has given confidence to every section of the society that BJP will solve their problems too. Today the appeasement of Congress has lost to the gratification of BJP."

He said Congress has neither any issue related to development nor any vision.

"Not only me, but the whole country is wondering over the way Congress has been behaving. Everyone is feeling ashamed of the activities of Congress, the language of this Party's leaders, their words, their ego...everything has been absolutely awful," PM Modi stated.

Prime Minister's remarks came in the backdrop of Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge's "venomous snake" remark on PM Modi.

He said, "Whenever there is a crisis in the country, then the leaders of Congress and JDS have done politics on that crisis also. Nowadays civil war is going on in Sudan. There is hue and cry. We are working day and night to bring back each and every Indian safely, but Congress leaders did politics on this too and provoked many families."

"Congress cheated farmers in the name of providing waivers whereas the BJP ensured welfare for farmers through excellent initiatives like PM KISAN Yojana. You have seen the 'Corruption Kaal' of Congress, now you are seeing the 'Amrit Kaal' under the BJP," PM Modi said.

He said the BJP and the double-engine government want to make Karnataka the number one state in the country.

Prime Ministers said BJP has opened around 9,000 Jan Aushadhi Kendras in the country which provide affordable and quality medicines to the people. This very initiative of the BJP has saved the poor and middle-class people of the country from spending Rs 20,000 crore, he said.

PM Modi, who is on a visit to poll-bound Karnataka, held another election campaign rally in Chitradurga on Tuesday.

Prime Minister lambasted Congress over the issue of security and said that the party has had a "history of appeasement of terrorists".

He said that unlike Congress which had left Karnataka "at the mercy of terrorists" the Bharatiya Janata Party has "broken the back" of terror and appeasement.

Referring to the 2008 Batla House encounter in which two terrorists were gunned down by a police team in their rented address in Delhi's Jamia Nagar, the Prime Minister took an apparent jibe at the then Congress chief Sonia Gandhi and said that she had "teary eyes" after hearing about the death of the terrorists.

"Congress has a history of appeasement of terror and terrorists. When the Batla House encounter took place in Delhi, then the biggest leader of Congress had teary eyes after getting the news of the terrorists' killings. When surgical strike and air strike happened, Congress questioned the capability of the forces of the country.

"You have seen in Karnataka how Congress has promoted terror. Congress had left Karnataka at the mercy of terrorists. It is the BJP which has broken the back of terror and has stopped the game of appeasement," the prime minister said.

PM Modi also "cautioned" the people of Karnataka against Congress and JDS, which are contesting the upcoming elections separately, and said that both parties are one by "their heart and deed".

"I want to caution you. The people of Karnataka have to beware of both Congress and JDS. They are two separate parties only to show, but they are one by their heart and deed. Both are dynastic, both promote corruption, and both do divisive politics to divide society. The development of Karnataka is not the priority of both parties," he said.

Karnataka Assembly polls will be held on May 10 and the counting of votes will take place on May 13.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)