"If Congress had won 20 more seats, then they all would have been jailed," says Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge

Srinagar, Sep 11: Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge criticised the Bhartiya Janta Party in a public meeting in Jammu and Kashmir on Wednesday.

He mentioned the importance for the alliance and the supporters to be unafraid of the BJP. He also appealed to the party supporters to fight together and not blame each other. "They (BJP) used to say 400 paar, 400 paar, where are your 400 seats? They stopped at 240 this time. If we had 20 more seats, then all these people would have been in jail, and they deserve to be there. So I appeal to everyone to not get angry, but instead fight. Your captain is strong, unafraid, everyone here is unafraid. The leaders are here to help solve any problem in Jammu and Kashmir. We need to win, we need to fight together, but while fighting, we should not blame each other."

He further criticised the BJP by saying that the government has not brought any manufacturing or factory jobs in the region.

"I want to point out, Infrastructure development has stopped here. 1 lakh job posts are empty here. If we come to power, we will fill those empty posts. The youths will get those jobs. These people (BJP) want to keep you poor. These people want to keep the people of Jammu and Kashmir poor, they can't even give the government job posts which are vacant right now, and they didn't even bring any big factories here. They didn't bring any manufacturing too," Kharge said in the public meeting.

"This is why we need to bring Congress and NC to power here, if we come to power, then tourism, manufacturing, and internship sectors would be in our focus," he added.

He also promised that the party would start the schools which had been previously shut down. "All 4,400 government schools which had been closed, we would start them again and educate the children. If we provide the education, only then would the youth progress," the Congress President said.

After the public meeting, Kharge again pointed out the 1 lakh job vacancies in the region and appealed to the people to not trust the BJP, and instead to strengthen the Congress-NC alliance by giving them their votes. "This is all a jhumla, they said that before also, but did they give the jobs? They promised to give 2 crore jobs, it has been 10 years, ones who couldn't even give 1 lakh jobs to the people here, those people will give 5 lakh jobs just like that? Do not trust the people who tell these lies. I appeal to the people of Jammu and Kashmir that the ones who are truthful, get stuff done, and have been with them since Independence till now are the Congress party and NC, give these parties your vote," he told ANI after the meeting.

Polling for Jammu and Kashmir is scheduled to be held in three phases: September 18, September 25 and October 1. The counting of votes is scheduled on October 8.