Gorakhpur: AICC General Secretary Smt. Priyanka Gandhi Vadra on October 31, 2021, targeted Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath in his home turf of Gorakhpur and made a flurry of poll promises, including farm loan waiver and purchasing wheat and paddy at Rs. 2500 per quintal.

Cutouts of Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel and Smt. Indira Gandhi have been erected at the venue of Congress’ Pratigya Rally in Uttar Pradesh’s Gorakhpur ahead of Priyanka Gandhi Vadra’s poll campaign. The large-sized cuts outs of the historically eminent personalities have been installed marking the 146th birth anniversary of Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel and the 37th death anniversary of Indira Gandhi.

Smt. Priyanka Gandhi Vadra said, “I think the idea of the BJP is to plunder the people and take them to the capitalists. Increase the inflation so much, increase it so much that the people cry out loud. You all know that in the last 7 years, since the Central Government, the BJP Government has come to the Center, the income of all the families has decreased. The farmer of the country earns only 27 rupees every day and the Prime Minister’s trillionaire friend earns thousand crore rupees in a day. When it comes to your loan waiver, the government says there is no money. When have their loans been waived, you ask them. He has sold all the properties. Congress built railways, airports, roads, everything was made to you, they are selling everything one-by-one, and they say what did they do in 70 years? I say that 70 years of hard work has been wasted in 7 years.”

On unemployment she said, “Today’s youth are unemployed. There are 5 crore unemployed youth in Uttar Pradesh itself. You might not know, but 3 youths commit suicide every day because of unemployment. 10 lakh government jobs are lying vacant. There is tremendous corruption in recruitment. Here in Gorakhpur also there was a lot of corruption in university recruitment. Listen, in Siddharthnagar, the education minister’s brother has got a certificate of upper caste (economically weak), so that he can get a job, but the one who is poor, he is not getting any such certificate, there is no job for him.”

“Things have happened against the ‘vaani’ (views) of Guru Gorakhnath. Bulldozers were used, threats were made to put people in jail,” she alleged at a rally, taking a swipe at Adityanath who is also the head of the prominent Mutt here named after Saint Gorakhnath.

The Congress general secretary also reached out to farmers and members of the fishing community.

“If the Congress is voted to power, then fisheries will be given the status of agriculture, and it will get all the facilities like agriculture. The rights of people of the Nishad community will be restored in sand mining and fisheries. Apart from this, a university named after Guru Machendranath will also be set up,” she said.

“The entire loans of the farmers will be waived. Wheat and paddy will be purchased at Rs. 2,500 per quintal, while sugarcane will be purchased at Rs. 400 per quintal. The problem of stray cattle will be resolved on the lines of Chhattisgarh, and a complete solution will be evolved,” she said.

The Congress general secretary added that government jobs will be given to 20 lakh youths, while contractual workers will be regularised.

The Anganwadi workers will get an honorarium of Rs. 10,000, and women will get three free cylinders in a year, she promised.

“Apart from this, if voted to power, our government will bear the cost of treatment of any illness up to Rs. 10 lakh,” she said.

She also said that Rs. 25,000 will be given to families who have lost their livelihood due to COVID-19.

Hitting out at Chief Minister Adityanath, who has been a five-time MP from Gorakhpur, the Congress general secretary said that the health scenario in the district is dismal. “As elections are approaching, we are hearing that AIIMS will be made functional. But nothing happened for five years. So how do you expect that it will be done now?” she asked.