Modi must discuss border dispute with Chinese Premier: Shukla

Congress leader Rajeev Shukla today asked Prime Minister Narendra Modi to raise the contentious border issue with visiting Chinese Premier Xi Jinping besides according red carpet treatment to him.
"Prime Minister Narendra Modi may without a doubt offer him red carpet treatment and serve Gujarati delicacies 'fafda' and 'dhokla' to the head of state, but he should also discuss the contentious border issue," the former union minister said.
"We (Congress) welcome the Chinese Premier to India and would like to remind that former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi had established good diplomatic relations between the two countries," he added.
India and China today inked three pacts, hours within the arrival of the Chinese President on a three-day visit to India during which the two countries will focus on boosting trade and investments, besides discussing substantive issues including the contentious border dispute

Gloating over BJP's reverses in all three rounds of by-elections conducted after it swept the Lok Sabha polls four months ago, Shukla said the dreams of "achhe din" have started to crumble.
The former union minister, who was here to attend a meeting of the Uttar Pradesh Cricket Association, said people wanted to defeat BJP and thats why they have given support to Congress in Rajasthan and Gujarat and Samajwadi Party in UP.

When asked whether Congress had not prepared well for UP bypolls, Shukla said, "its not that Congress was under-prepared in UP, but people in UP have seen that SP has a stronghold, and thats why they have elected SP representatives."

Reacting to yesterday's bypolls result, the Congress and Samajwadi Party had called it as a defeat of the communal forces and said people had rejected the Narendra Modi Government and BJP's "politics of polarisation".
"BJP had promised during Lok Sabha elections that they would control price rise, ensure better power supply among other things, but none has been addressed. People are disillusioned and have lost faith in the BJP. This is visible in the bypoll results. BJP had become arrogant," he said.
The Congress leader said Modi had shown people dreams of "acche din" (good days) but these dreams have been shattered in the first 100 days of their governance at the Centre.

"The bypoll results are shocking for BJP leaders. They had become arrogant after Lok Sabha elections," Shukla said.
BJP yesterday dealt a severe blow in its strongholds in Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan and Gujarat when it lost 13 of the 23 seats held by it there while the Congress put up a surprise showing in two of these states in the Assembly by-elections.
It was Uttar Pradesh, where the BJP was on a high after a near-total sweep of the 80 Lok Sabha seats, that delivered a humiliating blow to the saffron party as it lost seven of the 10 seats held by it as well as one belonging to its ally Apna Dal to the ruling Samajwadi Party.