Compare progress with AP, Rahul tells Nitish
Oct. 21: The Congress general secretary, Mr Rahul Gandhi, on Thursday mounted scathing attacks on the Bihar Chief Minister, Mr Nitish Kumar, at two election campaign rallies, saying the JD(U) stalwart’s claims of development in Bihar during the NDA regime and his self-projection as a secular leader were both misleading.
Hitting at the heart of Mr Kumar’s development rhetoric, Mr Gandhi said: “Nitishji always talks of the development work done by him in Bihar. If he is keen on assessing what he has achieved, he should not compare his work with Mr Lalu Prasad Yadav’s 15 years in power. He should look at the progress in Congress-ruled AP.” Mr Gandhi also hit out at Mr Kumar for projecting himself as a secular leader, saying: “He prevents Narendra Modi from campaigning in Bihar. That is all good. But it is not about campaigns. It is about ideologies.”
Meanwhile, the first phase of Assembly polls for 47 of the 243 seats passed off peacefully amid high security deployment on Thursday, registering 54.31 per cent voter turnout despite a slow start. All the constituencies witnessed multi-cornered contests with 631 candidates in the fray.
Barring a few minor skirmishes, including a bomb blast in Madhubani, some 2,000 voters at 10 booths boycotting the polls due to frustration over continual lack of development, polling at 10,868 booths spread across eight north-eastern districts remained largely peaceful.
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