Press Briefing Thursday, 23 Apr 2009

Shri Abhishek Singhvi addressed the media today.

SOME CONGRESS ACHIVEMENTS: – DIRECT IMPACT UPON INDIANS OF A PHILOSOPHY OF LOOKING AHEAD, OF INTERGENERATIONAL IMPACT

Sept 7th, 1972, Pokhran 1 - Indira Gandhi gives authorization to scientists at the Bhaba Atomic Research Centre (BARC) to detonate an indigenously designed nuclear device. Even Advani acknowledges that the NDA government just culminated a process started by her.

1981- Rajiv Gandhi meets urban developers under a tree in Gurgaon village. Turning point in urban housing development as later PM amends laws for the urban housing sector.

1982- Asian Games in Delhi- Under Indira Gandhi, the first mega sporting event held successfully in India showcasing India's capability to the world that it can do so. A forerunner to future events like the Cricket World Cup, ATP tour events, Badminton World Cup and now the Commonwealth Games.

1984- "The people's car", Maruti 800 rolls out. Under Rajiv Gandhi's visionary leadership, foresight and initiative the production was completed in a record 13 months. We all know what the Maruti Udyog is to India today after 25 years of service to the nation. The Nano is only a successor to the basic concept of an “aam admi’s” car, invented and implemented by the Congress.

1987- Rajiv Gandhi appoints Sam Pitroda, the telecom guru and inventor of the electronic diary, as advisor to the PM (himself). India's foreign and domestic telecommunications policies and the telecommunication revolution have changed the face of India.

1987-88- Jack Welch of GE visits India and is introduced to Rajiv Gandhi. Rajiv Gandhi clears opening up of GE office in Gurgaon, promises to help develop Gurgaon as an outsourcing hub. Outsourcing has today helped India Inc attain credibility in the world market. Another example of a great vision all from a young politician who thought generations ahead.

1991- Under Congress PM Narasimha Rao, Finance Minister Manmohan Singh delivers historic budget speech at Lok Sabha opening up the economy and initiating fiscal reforms including drastic cut in Tariffs, opening the door for foreign companies and FDI, overhauling tax systems with priority on infrastructure spending and convertibility of capital account.

2005- First time under the Congress led UPA government the Indian Railways post record profit. It is the largest government employer in the world and runs the largest network of rail services as well. Phenomenal achievement.

2007- The rupees 60000 crore farmer loan waiver may be unpopular with the urban population but it certainly is great news for the majority population of this country. The largest loan waiver post independence. Country still growing at 6-7% even with the worst global economic recession; several countries have zero or negative GDP growth during this time.

2008- Chandrayan, India's first unmanned moon mission completed successfully. India joins an elite group of 3-4 countries in the world to do so.

2008- India comes out of global nuclear isolation and can fulfill an important part of its energy needs with the signing of the 123 Agreement with the USA.

In Contrast, BJP Lacks - Netas, Netritva or Niti and Naitikta

BJP is indeed a party with a vision, a vision to divide the country, a vision of double standards, a vision of lies and deceit. In the attempt to cover up its core characteristics of hatred and communalism and no vision for development, there have been various vision statements released by BJP which yet again seem to be lifted from what Congress has already implemented or has laid the entire foundation stone and started implementing.

BJP is a party of copycats. There can be no better flattery of the Congress than the BJP’s blatant imitation (albeit belatedly) of Congress thinking and philosophy.

BJP’s flip flop, volte face hypocrisy on not just one issue but all issues.
BJP is trying to take credit for schemes envisioned and created by the Congress while first opposing them with vicious glee. This shows their destructive and grabbing mentality as well as paucity of vision. They are empty and hollow as far as throwing up netas, netritva, or niti and naitikta is concerned. Hijacking the achievements of the Congress is how low the BJP has stooped while blatantly whitewashing its own agenda-bereft manifesto. Its empty bag is heavy with only empty promises and much rhetoric.

NREGA: The BJP claims in its manifesto that “the much publicized National Rural Employment Guarantee Programme (NREGA) has turned out to be as much as a flop as all other schemes of the Government”.

But just when we were trying to understand their intention, BJP on Tuesday April 21st (in HT) said if the party came to power it would extend the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme to select cities including Delhi within 100 days of forming the government. VK Malhotra, a senior BJP leader in this article endorsed the scheme and promised to only take it forward. BJP was criticizing NREGA a few days back and saying that it was an ineffectual scheme. This clearly highlights BJP’s double speak and lack of vision.

Why would BJP want a flop scheme to be running? This clearly indicates that either they falsely wrote the manifesto or VK Malhotra disagrees with his party? Most importantly, it proves that NREGA is an unprecedented and successful Congress innovation.

NUCLEAR DEAL: The prime minister in waiting has publicly now made a laughing stock of his party and himself by agreeing to honor the 123 nuclear agreement with the US after sulking and attacking the congress as somehow bartering away the country lock stock and barrel. BJP had vowed to kill the agreement, just because Congress led UPA made it happen. Now, LK Advani in his interview to Shekhar Iyer on 21st April (in Hindustan Times) openly accepts the deal and promises to honor it. He couldn’t even stop himself from taking the credit for India’s nuclear program in history. Karan Thapar in the HT (19-7-2008) has detailed how hollow the claims of the BJP have been as far as the nuclear deal is concerned.

Dr Manmohan Singh readily and graciously called on Mr. Vajpayee to re-assure the BJP that the Indo-US nuclear deal does not endanger India’s strategic nuclear deterrent. Present at that meeting were LK Advani and Brajesh Mishra. Mr Advani agreed, but colleagues within the party allegedly (Arun Shourie, Yashwant Sinha and Jaswant Singh) stymied it even though they had heaped glowing words on it in Aug 2007.
These two stories reveal a sorry picture of the BJP’s top leadership. They are clearly prisoners of prejudice or unwilling to challenge their own colleagues. Or else why did they so conveniently flip-flop?

September 7th 1972, Pokharan 1 – Mrs. Indira Gandhi gave authorization to scientists at BARC, a step towards India realizing her nuclear dreams by detonating an indigenously designed nuclear device. Even Advani acknowledged that NDA government just culminated in Pokhra2 started by Indira Gandhi.

It was Congress’s vision and implementation that made India a nuclear power, and which was later falsely projected as NDA’s achievement with Pokhran 2. BJP could have done nothing in a few weeks in 1998 unless everything was made ready by the Congress earlier.
BJP’s attempt to associate with Congress achievements - DELHI METRO

In a situation that can only be characterized as utter hypocrisy, the BJP has been trying to wrench the credit for the metro in Delhi that has made it a city with international amenities. BJP sent out its cadre for slogan shouting and tried to take credit for the metro at Seelampur. Mr. Khurana claimed that he was instrumental in getting the project moving and that it had been cleared by Mr Advani — something which the Congress Government has totally disproved. Everybody knows it was Rajiv Gandhi's dream for Delhi in the 21st century and Congress led Sheila Dixit’s leadership in Delhi for three consecutive times.

Yet again in the pack of ambitious but hollow statements BJP dedicates its Infrastructure vision to a marvel Metro already, made a reality by Congress. The document also mentions the need of empowering 100 Sreedharans who can make it happen. Why do we need BJP when it is already happening?

BJP’s attempt to become tech savvy, a few decades behind schedule
BJP talks about computerization and telecom infrastructure. If India was to wait for BJP to realize the need, we would not have been where we are today. India has already left the BJP far behind.

In another attempt to look young BJP came out with its IT vision, drafted the same way like the Manifesto, which is a copy of the Congress’s manifesto. It is astonishing to see BJP take so many years to decode the movement that Late Mrs. Indira Gandhi followed by Late Mr. Rajiv Gandhi. BJP is simply showcasing something the Congress has successfully implemented and stood by for years.
The Congress ignited the space with opening the vast vistas of global telecom and then IT and letting the latest cutting edge technology stride into India. Indira Gandhi set up CDOT which was the nursery that seeded the huge IT manpower that let India leapfrog away from undeveloped economies. Rajiv Gandhi encouraged computerization hugely and today’s global leadership of India in this sphere lie squarely with the Congress.

BJP’s manifesto – No new ideas, no programs

AGRICULTURE : A vague statement in the manifesto saying “Waive agricultural Loans” – is that all BJP has for farmers?
Do they know why they want to do it or is it just because the congress led UPA government has already done it, having waived farm loans worth R. 65000crores.

TERRORRISM : BJP claims to “improve upon POTA”. In these three words – what else do they want to do beyond the UAPA that the congress led UPA government has not already enacted. There are only two provisions of POTA that have not been included in the amended UAPA. The first is the provision that confessions to a police officer will be admissible as evidence in court and the second is the provision that if the public prosecutor opposes bail the court should not grant bail. The first has been criticized by the Supreme Court and the second is opposed to all notions of justice. So one fails to understand how BJP wishes to “improve upon POTA”.

On a question of the prospects of the Congress party having any future pact with the BJD in Orissa and whether the Congress party is confident of coming back to power in Andhra Pradesh in view of the fact voting in second phase has been over, Dr. Singhvi said that he has just returned from Andhra and campaigned twice there. Dr. Singhvi said that if you just pick up the manifesto of Andhra, no other State in India has implemented such massive schemes of inclusive pro-poor development. A housing scheme promising 66 lakh low income houses out of which 19 lakhs have been handed over. The world’s largest irrigation scheme is going on in Andhra Pradesh. Dr. Singhvi said that he does not have any doubt that in both assembly and Parliament, Congress party will have a thumping majority.

Dr. Singhvi said that as far as Orissa is concerned, we should not and cannot speculate but certainly everything will be open to be decided and discussed in the light of the figures. However, subject to one basic point, we have to be absolutely convinced that any party which has been a part of those forces that we consider to be basically communal, have completely directly or indirectly in thought, action and deed severed their relations with them.

On the question of why Congress party is claiming the achievements in the Railways as their own whereas these are the achievements of Shri Lalu Prasad, the Railway Minister, Dr. Singhvi said that we do not play politics. Definitely this has been the achievement of the Congress-led UPA Government.

On another question of why Congress party is claiming the NREGA as their own whereas the same was introduced by the Minister belonging to RJD, Dr. Singhvi said that this was narrow thought process and further said that these were collective decisions taken by the Congress-led UPA Government. Definitely it can be termed as achievement of the Congress party led Government.

On the question whether the Congress party will seek the support of the Left after the results are out, Dr. Singhvi said that these are again speculative scenarios. Everything will be discussed and decided after the election and the election figures are out. As far as the specific question with regard to Left is concerned, Dr. Singhvi made it clear that on those issues where we think national interest requires us to take a decision, we have done so right through the 4-1/2 years of association in the previous UPA Government with the Left but ultimately no party including the Left has the jurisdiction to assert a VETO. There is no question of us or an absolute rule that we shall not talk to Left under any circumstances. The situation will be weighed but the situation has to be based on constructive cooperation and even constructive criticism. But no body will be allowed to have a VETO. In any case these are all speculative because the figures are going to tell a very different story in favour of the Congress led group.

(Tom Vadakkan)

Secretary, AICC