Congress president Sonia Gandhi on Wednesday failed to keep her date with people of poll-bound Himalayan state Uttarakhand as she was reported to have been developed fever on Wednesday morning. She was supposed to address a
rally here after laying the foundation stone for construction of a new railway line between Rishikesh and Karnaprayag, which has been a long-pending demand of people from Uttarkashi region.
Incidentally, the rally was going to be her first political outing after she underwent a surgery in the US recently. But at the rally a written speech was read out by a local leader on her behalf in the presence of defence minister A.K. Antony, who actually inaugurated the railway project, local MP Satpal Maharaj and other senior Congress leaders in the state.
It was a well-attended rally at the main Gauchar ground, where thousands of people had thronged to hear the Congress president. It was wonderful to watch that even after it was announced that Mrs Gandhi has not come and instead she has sent a written speech, people waited to listen to what “the tallest leader of the country” has to say. “Soniaji is the leader of the nation and we know that she loves us too. It is sad that she could not come today, but want to listen to her and so we are waiting for her speech to be read out,” said Phulchand Rawat, a local villager.
In her written speech, Mrs Gandhi confronted the issue of corruption head on, as she said, “By only making big noises over corruption, we cannot eradicate the malice from our system. For this we need to take action, which we are taking and results are apparent.”
Indirectly hitting at Anna Hazare and his team, who have given a thumbs-up to Uttarakhand chief minister B.C. Khanduri for enacting the Lokayukta Act in the state on the lines of the Jan Lokpal Bill, the Congress president said, “Corruption will not end if one set of people think that their corruption is smaller than others. We need to change the mindset in our fight against corruption.”