Rahul begins Congress electoral campaign in Delhi

The Congress vice-president lauded the Sheila Dikshit-led Delhi government's achievements in transforming the capital's infrastructure

Heralding the Congress’ electoral campaign in the capital, which goes to the polls later this year, party Vice-President Rahul Gandhi on Tuesday highlighted the United Progressive Alliance (UPA)’s landmark food Bill and lambasted the Opposition for criticising it.  

He lauded the Sheila Dikshit-led Delhi government’s achievements in transforming the capital’s infrastructure and did not forget to recognise the efforts of the “labourers living in slum and resettlement colonies” in building it. The Congress scion handed over documents offering ownership rights to the first batch of residents of the resettlement colonies in Delhi — Sriniwaspuri, Wazirpur, Satya Niketan, Janakpuri, Pankha Road and Madangir.  

"Delhi is not only the capital of the country, it symbolises the thinking of the whole nation. It is now the best city in the country,” he said. Gandhi is slated to kick off the electoral campaigns in assembly poll going states. He will address a meeting among tribal communities in Rajasthan on Wednesday.

"Is providing food to people called wastage of money.... The opposition says it is a wastage of money. We want the poor people of the country to stand on their feet," Gandhi said. “Earlier people talked about development, but we now talk about rights...we have raised the issue of people's right to get food.”

The UPA, he told the audience, had bestowed to the people landmark rights of food and employment (rural job bill).

On Tuesday, Gandhi distributed certificates conferring freehold rights to residents of resettlement colonies, developed 40 years ago. Around 1.3 million families will be benefited by the government decision.     

With the Congress President Sonia Gandhi away in the US for medical reasons, the Gandhi scion has to take the lead in leading the party’s electoral prospects in the coming polls. This is amid a growing chorus among Congressmen to name him the prime ministerial candidate, something that the Congress is reluctant to do as it would pit him directly against the Bharatiya Janata Party’s poster boy Narendra Modi.