Congress President promises rehabilitation of Kashmiri Pandits, financial assistance to women

Anantnag, Sep 11: Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge Wednesday said that the party would rehabilitate the displaced Kashmiri Pandits.

“We will fulfil the promise of rehabilitating the Kashmiri Pandit community made during the government of Manmohan Singh,” Kharge said addressing an election rally in south Kashmir’s Anantnag district.

He during his address gave five guarantees for the people of J&K if the Congress-NC alliance is voted to power.

“After the Congress-NC comes to power, we will get the statehood of J&K restored,” the Congress president said.

He said that they would also restore both the houses of the J&K Assembly.

Before August 5, 2019, Jammu and Kashmir had a bicameral assembly.

However, following the abrogation of Article 370, the government abolished the upper house.

Kharge promised a comprehensive health scheme, providing health coverage of Rs 25 lakh to each family in Jammu and Kashmir.

He promised to provide monthly financial assistance of Rs 3000 to women who head their families, besides offering women an interest-free loan of Rs 5 lakh.

The Congress president also vowed the restoration of 11 kg grain provision per person through the public distribution system.

He said that the BJP government had created a fearful environment in the country.

“From Kanyakumari to Kashmir and Ladkah, and from Manipur to Gujarat, they intimidate the workers of our party,” Kharge said.

He said that the government had been using different agencies to intimidate their workers.

“But now it is not the full-fledged government of Narendra Modi and is destined to collapse,” the Congress president said.

Blaming PM Modi for making false claims of crossing 400 seats, he said that they settled at 240.

“If we had taken 20 more seats, all of them would have been in jail,” Kharge said.

Urging people to not fall for the BJP’s false promises, he said that there was a disconnect between their words and actions.

“The BJP makes many promises, but there is a significant gap between their words and actions. They pledged 2 crore jobs but failed to recruit even 1 lakh people here,” the Congress president said.

PTI adds to the report

Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge  said that the BJP should stop making efforts to break alliances and political parties opposed to it as they have a minority government at the Centre which depends on TDP and JD-U for survival.

“The Congress and National Conference are contesting the (Jammu and Kashmir) elections together, which has made the BJP nervous. Now they are trying to break the alliance,” Kharge told reporters here.

They (BJP) are even fielding private players and supporting them indirectly as independents in an attempt to defeat Congress-NC candidates, he said and indicated that these independents are getting the money from the BJP.

“Now stop doing it, BJP. Your government is not 400 , it is 200 . It is a minority government. (Chandrababu) Naidu (TDP) can pull your feet anytime; Nitish Kumar (JD-U) can pull out anytime. You have given one hand to someone and one foot to someone else...you should tread carefully,” Kharge said.

The Congress president appealed to the people of Jammu and Kashmir to elect a strong government with a landslide majority that would solve their problems.

"If you elect a government on the balance (with a thin majority), the BJP will bring down the government overnight through horse-trading. It happened in my state, Karnataka. They bought 16 persons (MLAs). In Maharashtra, they split Shiv Sena and NCP to form the government. This (BJP government) is a 'tod phod sarkar,’” he said.

Kharge launched a scathing attack on the Narendra Modi government, alleging that the Prime Minister and Home Minister Amit Shah were making false promises.

“They have promised to give 5 lakh jobs. There are 1 lakh vacancies in the government in Jammu and Kashmir. Why were these not filled?" he asked.

The Congress chief claimed while unemployment and prices were on the rise, the BJP was giving away resources including minerals to its chosen people which has made local people poorer.

“People eat Dal and Sabzi but the BJP here is eating sand. They bring their people from outside to give them benefits here,” he said.

Kharge also hit out at PM Modi for, what he termed, misuse of foreign visits to malign the Congress party and Rahul Gandhi.

“There is not a single country where he has not set his foot. Met the Pakistan PM, got on a swing with the Chinese President, and met the Singapore PM as if they were family friends. Modi said Obama is a friend but campaigned for Trump when he said Ab ki baar Trump sarkar. Where in the world have we seen outsiders come and campaign?

“Modi talks against India across the world with just one aim to demean Congress and the image of Rahul Gandhi. In 60 years of Congress rule, we have never named and shamed India anywhere,” he said. “The NDA alliance has a broken leg which is running on the support of TDP and Nitish Kumar.”