Modi hits back at Sonia jibe

Gujarat CM says Cong is spreading poison

BJP’s prime ministerial candidate and Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday launched a counterattack on Congress president Sonia Gandhi over the latter’s “zeher ki kheti” remark saying that it was the Congress which was “full of poison”.

Addressing a rally in Meerut, about 450 km from here, Modi referred to Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi’s remarks that according to his mother “power is poison” and said that the Congress had ruled the country for 60 years and hence there was “more poison” in its “stomach”.

“Who has ruled for the maximum number of years....so if power is poison, who contains more power?...who is spewing venom?” the BJP leader said.

Sonia, while addressing a rally in Karnataka on Saturday, had reportedly said that the BJP was “sowing seeds of poison”. 

Modi also referred to the bitterness over the move to create a separate state of Telangana out of Andhra Pradesh to accuse the Congress of spreading poison. 

“Earlier, when new states were created, people had celebrated...now see what is happening?” he remarked.

In his 45-minute speech, Modi targeted the United Progressive Alliance government at the Centre, Samajwadi Party (SP) supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav and the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) government in Delhi.

He appealed to the people not to “fall into the trap of vote- bank politics” and instead “support the politics of development”. Modi termed the Congress as a “divisive party”. “The Congress believes in divide and rule...it believes in vote-bank politics,” he said.

He also attacked the AAP government in Delhi for failing to ensure safety of women. “The incidents that occurred in Delhi have made us hang our heads in shame...an African woman was ill treated and a boy form Arunachal Pradesh was killed,” he said.