["If Modi comes to power then our country will be
divided and it will be a danger for us. Modi is not being pushed forward by
farmers and poor people of Gujarat. He is being pushed forward by big
industrialists of the country," he said.]
PTI Burdwan (West
Bengal)
Claiming that the country will be divided if BJP leader
Narendra Modi comes to power, CPI(M) Politburo member Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee
on Tuesday said Modi is a candidate who has been pushed forward only by
industrialists.
"If Modi comes to power then our country will be divided
and it will be a danger for us. Modi is not being pushed forward by farmers and
poor people of Gujarat. He is being pushed forward by big industrialists of the
country," he said.
"It is a dangerous trend that industrialists are
pitching in for Modi," the former West Bengal Chief Minister said while
addressing rally here.
Bhattacharjee on Tuesday reiterated that both the Trinamool
Congress and the BJP have entered into a covert alliance.
"We know that BJP and Trinamool are in a covert
alliance. This is not a new claim. Earlier also we have seen them as
allies," he said.
Bhattacharjee noted that the present UPA regime and Prime
Minister Manmohan Singh have to go after the next Lok Sabha elections due to
their anti-people policies.
"The condition of the Manmohan Singh government is not
good. They will have to leave because of their anti-people policies," he
said, claiming that the Trinamool Congress was also responsible for the
anti-people policies pursued by the UPA regime as it had been an alliance
partner for three years.
"Trinamool can't run away from its responsibilities as
anti-people policies like deregulation of oil prices and many other decisions
were taken when they were part of the UPA," the CPI(M) leader said.
Criticising the state government for not ordering a CBI
inquiry into the Saradha ponzi scam, Bhattacharjee said, "Why is the state
government not confiscating the property of Saradha group? We want a CBI
inquiry into the Saradha scam. Only a CBI inquiry can bring out the
truth."
[Whispers among Delhi’s political establishment suggested that he had no chance of competing in a system known for corrupt payouts and among voters who expected handouts. But two weeks ago, Aam Aadmi won 28 seats in Delhi’s elections, compared with eight by the once-dominant Indian National Congress Party. Most embarrassing, Sheila Dikshit, the Congress Party’s longtime chief minister, was crushed in her own constituency. Those results may signal that India’s longtime political dynasty, the family of Sonia and Rahul Gandhi, could soon lose its grip on power.]
NEW DELHI —
Ever since independence, New Delhi’s leaders have commandeered the city’s most
valuable real estate for themselves — living in the same bungalows behind the
same walls left by British colonialists.
But on Monday, Arvind
Kejriwal, Delhi’s new chief minister, vowed for the first time to break from
India’s colonial past by promising that neither he nor his ministers would take
up residence in those sumptuous homes.
He also promised to do
away with a culture of privilege that allows ministers and top bureaucrats to
zip through Delhi’s traffic in motorcades with police escorts and flashing
lights.
In a letter dated
Monday, a top Delhi police official wrote to Mr. Kejriwal’s private secretary
that “Delhi police needs to give the security to him as per the norms,” and
asked where the vast police detail should be sent.
In a handwritten
response, Mr. Kejriwal wrote that he did not need security.
“God is my biggest
security,” he wrote.
He did add, however,
that he “would be grateful if some help is provided for crowd management or
screening at a few places where I get mobbed.”
Mr. Kejriwal’s elevation
to chief minister of India’s capital city is among the most unlikely and
meteoric rises to power in Indian history. At 45, he is Delhi’s youngest chief
minister ever, replacing a woman 30 years his senior.
A former tax
commissioner, Mr. Kejriwal gained national attention three years ago as the top
adviser to Anna Hazare, the activist who has pushed India’s Parliament to adopt legislation creating an
independent corruption monitor. The movement fell apart amid resistance from
the governing United Progressive Alliance and growing tension between Mr.
Hazare and Mr. Kejriwal.
Mr. Hazare continued to
push for the legislation but believed he needed to do so in a nonpartisan way.
Mr. Kejriwal disagreed, saying the failure of the movement meant he needed to
become directly involved in electoral politics. So last year he formed his own
party — known as Aam Aadmi, or Common Man — and declared his intention to fight
in Delhi’s state elections.
Whispers among Delhi’s
political establishment suggested that he had no chance of competing in a
system known for corrupt payouts and among voters who expected handouts. But
two weeks ago, Aam Aadmi won 28 seats in Delhi’s
elections, compared with eight by the once-dominant Indian National Congress
Party. Most embarrassing, Sheila Dikshit, the Congress Party’s longtime chief
minister, was crushed in her own constituency. Those results may signal that
India’s longtime political dynasty, the family of Sonia and Rahul Gandhi, could
soon lose its grip on power.
The Bharatiya Janata
Party, a Hindu nationalist party, won 31 seats in Delhi’s elections and was
initially asked to form a government. But neither of the Hindu party’s rivals
would lend support, so Mr. Kejriwal’s turn came.
Whether Mr. Kejriwal was
willing to govern with help from the Congress Party, which he had criticized as
hopelessly corrupt, was the much-asked question.
Mr. Kejriwal asked the
people. More than half a million sent emails and text messages, and the party
reported that the overwhelming response was that he should govern.
“It is not me who will
be the chief minister,” Mr. Kejriwal told reporters in his office on Monday.
“It will be Delhi’s common man who will be the chief minister. Alone I cannot
do anything.”
Significant challenges
remain. Delhi is one of the world’s most polluted and crowded cities. A third
of its residents live in slums with little access to sanitation or clean water;
its electricity is fitful and its roads and infrastructure poor. Inflation is
soaring, and India’s economy is flagging.
While he based his
campaign on eliminating corruption, Mr. Kejriwal also promised to slash
electricity rates in half and give free water to every Delhi household. He also
promised to build 200,000 community and public toilets.
“It is easy to lead a
movement but difficult to run a political party,” said Sudha Pai, a political
science professor at Jawaharlal Nehru University. “Now they have to deliver on
their promises of cheap electricity, free water and corruption-free government.
Those are not easy promises to fulfill.”
Hari Kumar contributed reporting.
