Rahul sounds poll bugle in UP, attacks rivals

Reaching out to the people of Uttar Pradesh ahead of the 2017 assembly election, Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi on Friday charged his political opponents with "paying lip service" to the state and asserted Sheila Dikshit was "highly experienced" to change UP's face. Sharat Pradhan/Rediff.com report from Lucknow.

Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi on Friday took everyone by surprise by asserting that his party was preparing itself to stage a come back by emerging as number one in the 2017 state assembly elections in UP.

Gandhi said the Congress will go it alone in the 2017 Uttar Pradesh assembly election and will form an "alliance only with the people of the state".

"We are contesting the election to get complete majority in the Assembly and have our own chief minister...You know what has happened in the last 27 years when different parties have only divided the state," the Congress vice president said during an interactive session with party workers here.

Replying to a query from one of the workers who sought an assurance that the party will not go for a pre-poll tie-up with any other outfit as it had only harmed it in the past, Rahul said, "We will have an alliance (only) with the Congress workers and every citizen of the state.

"It is a fight of ideologies...We have to help Uttar Pradesh get its rightful place...While Congress brings all together, other parties divide them," he said, adding that the party will work out a strategy for the UP election to "wipe away the anger in the mind of people against each other".

Rahul said the party wants to give more representation to women and youth when it comes to allotment of tickets for the state polls.

His assertion came as a huge morale booster for the over 50,000 party enthusiasts who had converged here from different corners of the state to formally get enrolled as active booth-level workers in the party.

The Congress VP answered these questions in the presence of top party leaders, including Sheila Dikshit, Ghulam Nabi Azad, Raj Babbar, Jitin Prasad, Pramod Tiwari, Sanjay Singh, Rita Bahuguna Joshi and Rajiv Shukla.

The event was organised  at the conclusion of a 600 km yatra undertaken from Delhi to Lucknow by newly appointed UP Congress president Raj Babbar and the party’s chief ministerial nominee Sheila Dikshit, essentially to highlight how UP had suffered during the 27 years of non-Congress rule.

With ‘27 saal -- UP behal’ as the theme of the ‘yatra’, the gathering comprised largely of volunteers accompanying each of the aspirants with the commitment that they would man the polling booths in their respective constituencies. 

To a question whether Dikshit was fit enough to be projected as Congress's chief ministerial candidate, he said she has vast experience.

"Sheila has changed the face of Delhi. People in Delhi repent the mistake they did by voting for a party which is more interested in doing drama and no work," he said.

Rahul voiced confidence that his party will come to power in the state for which, he said, Congress workers should make people aware of the party's policies and programmes by staying united and transcending barriers of "groupism and petty rivalry".

Posters with slogan '27 saal, UP behaal' dotted the city's thoroughfares while welcome arches were set up on the road from the airport to the venue -- Rama Bai ground -- where a massive ramp was erected for the Congress vice-president to interact with a large audience.

This was the first major interactive session of Rahul after he along with Congress President Sonia Gandhi launched the party's election campaign by flagging of the '27 saal, UP behaal' yatra earlier this month from New Delhi.