Jaipur/Bhilwara/Alwar/Udaipur: Sharpening BJP’s nationalism pitch, Union home minister Amit Shah Sunday placed Vande Mataram at the centre of his attack on Congress, accusing the party of abandoning the national song for “vote bank politics”.Addressing the Atal Gaurav Smriti Samaroh in Nimbahera, Chittorgarh, Shah alleged UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi got the song stopped midway during the Independence Day programme at Congress headquarters in New Delhi Saturday.“Look at Congress’ shamelessness. Vande Mataram was being sung at Congress headquarters when Sonia ji asked the party president to stop it midway,” Shah alleged. “India will not forgive Sonia Gandhi. If Congress leaders have even a little shame left, they should fold their hands and apologise to the immortal soul of Bankim (Chandra Chatterjee) Babu and to the people.”Shah’s cross-state sweep through Rajasthan — covering Udaipur, Nimbahera and Alwar — came days before dates for civic body polls are to be announced, turning official programmes into a spree for announcements of development projects alongside a pointed political attack on Congress that BJP is likely to use as its campaign plank in the local polls.Praising Prime Minister Narendra Modi for “restoring the honour” of Vande Mataram on its 150th anniversary, Shah said the national song was played from the ramparts of Red Fort for the first time on this year’s Independence Day.While in Nimbahera, Shah unveiled a 21-foot statue of former prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee. He also virtually inaugurated and laid foundation stones for 944 development works across 15 districts, besides announcing tap water connections under Jal Jeevan Mission for 1,500 villages.Paying tribute to Vajpayee, Shah said the former prime minister’s life was guided by the principle of “nation first”. He said Vajpayee spent four decades in opposition but remained committed to nationalism and later took consequential decisions for India’s development as prime minister.Referring to the 1998 Pokhran nuclear tests, Shah said Vajpayee did not bow to international pressure. He also praised the late PM for his initiatives in village road connectivity, the Golden Quadrilateral highway project and the creation of the tribal affairs ministry.Shah said Modi had carried forward Vajpayee’s work on tribal welfare, increasing the ST component budget from Rs 25,000 crore to Rs 1.25 lakh crore, besides setting up tribal museums and Eklavya schools. He said the impact of these policies was visible in the country’s current president coming from a poor tribal family.Invoking Mewar’s historical and political symbolism, Shah described the region as no less than Kashi for patriots. He paid tribute to Maharana Pratap, Veer Poonja Bhil and Seth Bhamashah, calling Mewar a “heroic land” that had told the Mughals, “You may defeat us in battle, but you cannot make us bow.”“I bow to the nation’s pride, Maharana Pratap,” he said.Shah also praised chief minister Bhajan Lal Sharma and said Rajasthan govt was moving quickly to fulfil its promises, citing the three major water agreements with Haryana, Gujarat and Punjab as a major accomplishment.Contrasting BJP’s welfare delivery with that of previous Congress govts, Shah claimed that while Congress provided tap water to “11 lakh homes in 70 years,” Modi govt supplied it to “64 lakh homes in eight”.Also in Nimbahera, The Union home minister handed out appointment letters to five of 10,548 new appointees at the Chief Minister Employment Festival.At another programme in Alwar later in the day, Shah said the first phase of Alwar medical college building had been inaugurated and named after Vajpayee, adding that development works worth Rs 500 crore were being undertaken for the region’s farmers and livestock rearers.He also promised to expand Alwar dairy’s processing capacity from 3 lakh litres per day to 5 lakh litres per day, adding that the time taken for milk payments would be reduced from 15 days to seven days within one-and-a-half years.In a sign of how the day’s official events doubled as BJP’s local poll positioning, Shah said works worth Rs 11,000 crore had been inaugurated so far in Rajasthan, and urged people to “wipe out Congress” in the upcoming local body polls.
