SHIMLA: For the Congress, OROP means ‘only Rahul, only Priyanka’, said BJP president Amit Shah Monday, giving a novel expansion to the acronym for ‘one rank, one pension’ scheme.
The BJP president gave the sarcastic expansion to the acronym, while addressing at Una a “BJP Panna Pramukh Sammelan” for Lok Sabha constituency of Hamirpur, also known as “Martyrs’ Land” owing to the large population of the district and adjoining areas working in the Army.
Shah made the jibe days after induction of the party president Rahul Gandhi’s sister Priyanka Gandhi as the Congress general secretary for the eastern Uttar Pradesh.
Thanking Himachal Pradesh voters for ensuring victory of BJP candidates on all four Lok Sabha seats in the state during the 2014 general elections, Shah said, “The Modi government implemented OROP for ex-servicemen in true sense.”
No one cared for soldiers for over 70 years, he said, adding when the Modi government came to power, it implemented the OROP.
Addressing BJP workers ahead of the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, Shah said, “Desh ek Majboot Sarkar chahta hai, majboor sarkar nahi. (The country wants a strong government not a weak and hapless one).”
The country wants a government which can give Pakistan a befitting reply for killing its soldiers, he said.
“In his speeches, the Congress president nowadays brings up the issue of poverty. I just want to ask Rahul baba what the Congress governments did for decades to eradicate poverty. It’s only the BJP government which is taking measures to eradicate it,” he added.
They couldn’t provide even a gas cylinder to each household in the country, he said.
Himachal got only Rs. 44,325 crores from the 13th Finance Commission during the Congress government, while the Modi government gave Rs. 1,15,865 crores to this hilly state, he added.
The BJP president said like late Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, Modi too remains connected with the state.
Without naming former Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh and his family members, Shah said, “No one else except raja, rani and rajkumar was given importance during five-year term of the previous Congress government in the state.”
On the contrary, the Himachal residents now feel that the Jai Ram Thakur-led BJP government is their own government, he said, adding a total of 20,062 complaints out of 25,227 have been redressed in Jan Manch programmes launched by the Thakur government.
BJP workers are the basis of our victory and every BJP Panna Pramukh is determined to make Modi the PM again, said Shah, coining a slogan “mera booth, sabse majboot” for the party workers.
Himachal Pradesh CM Thakur, former chief ministers PK Dhumal and Shanta Kumar, besides BJP national organising secretary Ram Lal and MP Anurag Thakur too spoke on the occasion. PTI