Barabanki, UP: Addressing a joint rally with his sister Priyanka Gandhi, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Monday trained his guns on the Mayawati government for Uttar Pradesh's "backwardness" suggesting a 'big elephant' is eating the funds sent by the Centre, alluding to the BSP.
Rahul accused the BSP government of not passing on the Central funds to the villages and cited this as a factor for the "state's backwardness."
"The Centre has sent Rs 165 crore for Uttar Pradesh ... Such an amount has never been given to the state earlier. Did you know that the money reaches Lucknow and then vanishes ... Somebody told me that a 'big elephant' in Lucknow eats the funds sent by the Centre," Gandhi told a rally in Barabanki in the presence of Priyanka.
He asked the assembled people whether they knew who this "elephant" was, referring to the pachyderm, which is the election symbol of the BSP.
Gandhi alleged that when he had gone to Bundelkhand, people there did not know what National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) was because the funds for it were not reaching the poor.
"The UP Chief Minister Mayawati says that NREGA is not beneficial ... when the funds don't reach the beneficiaries, then what will happen," the Congress MP from Amethi said.