PM Modi also accused the Congress of being responsible for the Partition (File).
Barabanki (UP):
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday here alleged that the Congress will run a bulldozer over the Ram temple if the INDIA bloc comes to power.
Addressing an election rally, PM Modi said the Congress is planning to challenge the Supreme Court’s order on the Ram temple once it comes to power and will eventually demolish the temple.
“If Samajwadi Party-Congress comes to power, it will send Ram Lalla once again to a tent, and a bulldozer will be rolled over the temple,” he said.
PM Modi also accused the Congress of being responsible for the Partition. He said what used to be thought of as impossible – that the country could ever be divided – was done by the party.
“When the freedom struggle was going on and the talk of dividing the country used to come up, every person used to wonder: Can the country be divided? Did it happen or not? They did it or not? They can go to any extent. Their track record is such,” he said referring to the Congress.
“The country does not matter to them. For them, the game is for family and power,” he added.
The Prime Minister was in Barabanki to seek support for party candidate Rajrani Rawat who is contesting from the Lok Sabha seat.
He thanked the people for voting for him in the previous elections, saying it was their vote which ended the “500-year-long” wait for the Ram Mandir.
“People from Barabanki walked on foot to Ayodhya with bricks with ‘Ram’ inscribed on them. The youngsters, the first-time voters, will not understand the 500 years of wait … Generation after generation of our ancestors struggled and sacrificed,” he said.
He alleged that Congress under its regime sent Ram Lalla to a “tent” and when it, along with the Samajwadi Party, was invited to the temple’s consecration ceremony, the party refused to attend.
“There is so much poison in their belly… I don’t know what enmity they have with Ram,” PM Modi said.
In Barabanki, there are 13 candidates in the fray with the main contest between Tanuj Punia of the Congress and BJP’s Rajrani Rawat.
Mr Punia is the son of Congress leader PL Punia, a former MP from Barabanki (SC) Lok Sabha seat.
In March, a day after an explicit video allegedly involving him surfaced online, sitting BJP MP Upendra Singh Rawat, who was fielded again by the party, said he would not contest any election until proven innocent.
Subsequently, the party gave the ticket to Rajrani Rawat.
Barabanki will vote in the fifth phase of the Lok Sabha elections in the state on May 20.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
