Youth powered India set to overtake China, England: Mahajan

Riding high on youth power, India is progressing fast and would soon leave China and England behind, National president of Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha (BJYM) Punam Mahajan today said.

Addressing a "Yuva Sammelan" (youth conference) here today, Mahajan said India has a huge youth population of 75 per cent and 65 per cent of the people are below 25 years of age.

"India is now prepared in such a way that it will overtake China and England very soon at the pace it is going. This is the golden era for India, Mahajan said.

The Yuva Morcha leader added that youths ensured that "Lal Salaam" (red salute) became redundant which led to a regime change in Tripura.

"The Left Front government led people from poverty to worse. They (youth) chose to overthrow the worthless government and bloom lotus," Mahajan said and congratulated BJP and Yuva Morcha activists for emerging victorious against the Left Front.

Addressing a state-level conference of the Bhartiya Janta Yuva Morcha, Mahajan appreciated gymnast Dipa Karmakar of Tripura and advised youths to contribute towards the development of society.

She blamed the previous Left Front government for unemployment and said that despite being a literate state, eight lakh people of a population of 37 lakh are unemployed.

"We have seen our karyakartas (workers) being martyred. Recently, I have seen Yuva Morcha activists killed in Kerala and West Bengal," she said.

State in-charge of BJP in Tripura Sunil Deodhar said that after coming to power, the real challenge facing the party is to fulfill the dreams of people.

"Our real test has started after coming to power. Earlier, we were only delivering lectures against the misrule of CPI(M), but now the time has come for fulfilling the dreams of people," Deodhar said.

He said Chief Minister Biplab Deb and the ministers of the state are very hard working, adding Deb himself works for 18 hours a day and the other ministers work for at least 16 hours.

The BJP-Indigenous Peoples Front of Tripura (IPFT) combine swept to power by winning 44 seats in the 60-member assembly in the February 18 elections.

Deodhar said the Ganamukti Parishad, the tribal wing of the CPI(M) during its rule had exploited the tribals so much that it paved the way for winning 17 seats out of the total 20 tribal reserved seats.

Deodhar also urged the party workers not to pay attention to media reports about the party's functioning as they are always after "spicy news".

"A newspaper had written that there is tussle between me and the chief minister. This is not right. The newspapers always look for spicy news, because they have to sell their papers," he said.