BJP govt transformed lives of tribal, poor people: Shah

BJP president Amit Shah on Wednesday said the Congress merely talked of "garibi hatao" (remove poverty) during its 60-year rule whereas Prime Minister Narendra Modi took various initiatives to transform the lives of tribal and poor people as he, having lived in poverty, knew what it was to be poor.

Shah said the Congress kept the tribal and poor populations underdeveloped, but the Narendra Modi government gave them priority in development leading to their all-round progress in just four years.

The BJP president, on a one-day visit to Jharkhand to tone up the party organisation ahead of next year's Lok Sabha election, was addressing a function of intellectuals of "Janjatiya Samaj" (tribal society).

The Congress had been talking of 'garibi hatao' but it is Modi who took pro-poor initiatives to transform the lives of the tribal and poor populace, Shah said.

"How life is without electricity? What happens to the poor when he or his family is struck by any disease? And this is the reason his government is administering the country on the philosophy of 'Sabka Saath, Sabka Vikas' (collective efforts, inclusive growth)," he said.

Accusing the opposition of "misleading" the people against the Centre and the BJP-ruled state governments, Shah claimed, "What the four-year-old Narendra Modi government did, the Congress failed to do in 60 years of its rule."

Shah said that when the NDA government was formed, Modi had promised that the government would be of the poor, the Dalits and the tribals and it had worked in that direction only.

And it has shown results as vaccination for all most all the downtrodden including ST families has been completed, crores of bank accounts have been opened under the Jan Dhan Yojana, 10 crore poor families, that is, 50 crore people are being insured under the new health insurance scheme for Rs five lakh, he said listing the NDA government's achievements.

Most of the districts of Jharkhand, which were lagging behind in development, have been included in the central government's scheme for development at par with the other developed districts, he said.

The central government has disbursed over four lakh crore of rupees in the last four years to the Jharkhand government for its all round development. Out of the four lakh crore rupees, given to Jharkhand, Rs 1.7 lakh crore was given against the auction of mines.

He claimed that the Modi government has electrified 20,000 villages of the country that remained without electricity even after 60 years of Independence and most of these villages were tribal-dominated or remote.

Shah said that it was a historic decision on the part of the Modi government to raise the minimum support price (MSP) for Kharif crops to one-and-half times the cost of production.

He appreciated the works being done by the Raghubar Das government in Jharkhand. The state government was committed to providing electricity to all homes in Jharkhand by this year-end.

Besides meeting the intellectuals, Shah held meetings with BJP's assembly constituencies in-charge and office-bearers of the party at party office. Shah is also slated to meet volunteers of the party's social media unit.