‘Congress Policy Is Divide, Lie & Rule’: PM Modi in Puducherry
The PM’s visit to Puducherry comes just days after the Congress government led by V Narayanasamy fell.
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Criticising Congress for ‘lying to its people’, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, while addressing people of Puducherry on Thursday, 25 January said, “Our colonial rulers had the policy of divide and rule. Congress has a policy of divide, lie and rule. Sometimes their leaders put region against region, community against community.”
Ahead of the Assembly elections due by May, Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited Tamil Nadu and Puducherry on Thursday.
This remark comes after Congress President Rahul Gandhi said on Tuesday, 23 February, in Thiruvananthapuram, "For the first 15 years, I was an MP in the North. I had gotten used to a different type of politics. For me, coming to Kerala was very refreshing, as suddenly I found that people are interested in issues and not just superficially but going into detail in issues."
‘Want Puducherry to be the BEST’: Modi
The PM’s visit to Puducherry comes just days after the Congress government led by V Narayanasamy fell after losing majority. Several members of the Congress-DMK alliance had quit in the last one month, with some joining the BJP. Moreover, a few days before the government collapsed, Kiran Bedi was removed as the lieutenant governor of the UT and replaced by Tamilisai Soundararajan, who was given additional charge.
Addressing hundreds of people, Modi spoke about how Congress was losing support among people.
“People all over India are rejecting Congress, their seats in Parliament is the lowest ever. Congress culture of feudal politics, dynasty politics, patronage politics is ending. India is young, aspirational and forward-looking,” he said.
Development for ‘Farmer Brothers’ of the South: PM Modi
PM Modi inaugurated and laid the foundation stone of various development initiatives in Puducherry. He went to Coimbatore in the evening and inaugurated multiple infrastructure projects worth over Rs 12,400 crore.
This includes the Neyveli New Thermal Power Project, designed for a power generation capacity of 1000 MW and built at a cost of about Rs 8,000 crore, that will serve Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, and Puducherry. “Coimbatore is a city of industry and innovation. Tamil Nadu is making a major contribution to India's industrial growth. One of the major factors is the continuous power supply,” Modi said in Coimbatore.
He also laid the foundation stone for the extension, renovation and modernisation of the Lower Bhavani Project System that will rehabilitate the existing irrigation structures in the system and increase the efficiency of the canals.
“Tamil Nadu has a glorious history of sea trade. The projects will further strengthen the cargo handling ability of the ports and will support the green port initiative. These development projects will benefit our farmer brothers of the south,” he said.
He laid the foundation stone for development of Integrated Command and Control Centers (ICCC) in nine ‘Smart Cities’, including Coimbatore, Madurai, Salem, Thanjavur, Vellore, Tiruchirappalli, Tiruppur, Tirunelveli, and Thoothukudi.
Various parties are in the fray for the Tamil Nadu Assembly elections, with the AIADMK and BJP on one side, and the DMK and the Congress on the other. The release of former AIADMK leader VK Sasikala from jail recently has also led to a political tussle in the state.
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