Rahul Gandhi takes on BJP on poverty issue

Panipat (Haryana), Oct 10(ANI): Congress General Secretary Rahul Gandhi on Saturday lambasted the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) over the issue of poverty in the country and its reaction on Congress party's stance on it.

Referring to BJP's reaction on his taking David Miliband, visiting British Foreign Secretary, to Amethi in Uttar Pradesh in January (2009), Rahul Gandhi said that the Congress party wanted to raise the problems faced by the poor section of the country, the BJP was embarrassed about poverty.

"I opened the newspaper and read the opposition was saying that Rahul Gandhi took the 'English minister' to a village. They are embarrassed about poverty. They want to hide it. We don't want to hide it, we want to eliminate it," Rahul Gandhi said.

Congress General Secretary was addressing an election rally in Panipat ahead of the Haryana State Assembly elections to be held on October 13

Also taking a dig at the BJP election campaign in 2004 Lok Sabha elections wherein the party had projected India as, 'India Shining', and Rahul said that the BJP wanted to divide the country between rich and poor.

"The opposition talked about numerous issues, terrorism, Pakistan, Jinnah, but not once have they talked about poverty. It seems they don't like the word. They want to divide India into two, one the English 'India Shining' and the second that is yours and mine and of the poor people of the country," Gandhi said. (ANI)