Lucknow: It will be round two of the electoral battle between the Rahul Gandhi and Smriti Irani in Uttar Pradesh’s Amethi as BJP announced on Thursday evening that it has fielded the union minister to take on the Congress chief from the Gandhi bastion again.
Irani had unsuccessfully contested against Gandhi in the 2014 Lok Sabha election and had lost by around 1 lakh votes, but was seen to have put up a spirited fight. The Congress has earlier announced the candidature of Gandhi from Amethi.
Speaking to CNN-News18 after the BJP’s first list of candidates was announced, Irani said the “writing is on the wall for Rahul Gandhi".
Dubbing the fight as one between a Kaamdar and Naamdar, she claimed that while Rahul Gandhi never found the time to address the key issues of the people of Amethi, she had given most of her time to the people there in the last five years. She said she will go to the constituency soon to begin her campaign.
Gandhi, in turn, has blamed the ruling BJP government at the centre and state for taking away the big projects that he had lined up for Amethi.
With the SP and BSP combine deciding not to contest from the Congress stronghold, this election will see a direct contest between Gandhi and Irani.
The union minister said the “walkover" by the two regional parties spoke volumes about the position of Congress in Amethi.
Earlier, UP CM Yogi Adityanath while speaking at Agenda India event by News18 had said that the party was confident of winning 74 out of 80 Lok Sabha seats in the state including Amethi and Azamgarh.
While on her recent visit to Amethi in the month of February, Irani had hit out at the Congress alleging that the 'naamdars' (dynasts) who ruled for over five decades, never thought about the development of Amethi.
“The MP from Amethi never raised the problems of its people in Parliament. People like these have only duped the poor and people of Amethi, on whose votes he has reached Parliament," she said.
Comments
0 comment