Rahul Gandhi questions Gujarat model in Pune

As the campaign for the second round of polling in Maharashtra wrapped up, Rahul Gandhi addressed a large gathering of supporters at Pune's SSPMS grounds along with Maharashtra Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan.

A common thread in the speeches of both leaders was an attack on the BJP's prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi accusing him of an "authoritarian style of functioning" and "misusing the state machinery". While Gandhi mocked the 'Gujarat model', the chief minister likened Modi to Adolf Hitler.

"He has hijacked the entire party. He insulted senior leaders such as Advani and Joshi. It shows his authoritarian way of functioning. Even in Germany there was a leader called Hitler who was known for his authoritarian ways," said Chavan speaking just before Gandhi addressed the gathering.

Talking to a large crowd on a sweltering summer afternoon in Pune, Gandhi was in the city to seek support for the party's candidate Vishwajeet Kadam. He invoked the city's leaders, right from Shivaji to Gopal Krishna Gokhale and Lokmanya Tilak. "The real strength of Pune is the idea of brotherhood that is seen in the city," he said.

The Congress vice president went on to talk about two diverse streams of thought that the city has seen-a unifying path taken by Bal Gangadhar Tilak, Mahatma Gandhi and Gopal Krishna Gokhale and at the other end, the line of thought taken by Nathuram Godse which was about dividing and anger.

"But if you look at history, the line of thought that seeks to bind always won over the one that sought to divide. This is the thought of Gandhiji and of the Congress," he said.

Focusing his attack on Modi, Gandhi the Gujarat Chief Minister of having turned the BJP into a "one man party" where other voices were suppressed and only he was heard. "Earlier the party had leaders like Advani, Vajpayee and Jaswant Singh and there still was some amount of discussions in the party. That doesn't happen now," he said.

Accusing Modi of having favoured certain industrialists, Gandhi stated that the Gujarat government had "sold a tract of land as big as Maharashtra's Aurangabad city for only Rs 300 crore to Adani". "He even gave away a coastal tract, as large as Mumbai's coastline for Rs 35 crore to one single person," he said.

Armed with figures, he attached the 'Gujarat model', saying that Modi had favoured only certain people and had sold "one metre of land for Rs 1 to favour certain individuals".

"He gave a loan of Rs 10,000 crore at 0.1 per cent interest rate for the Tata Nano plant. The money he gave one businessman, could have been used for the upliftment of the poor and education," he said. Claiming that 40 lakh families were below the poverty line, Gandhi said that "every second child is hungry" in the state of Gujarat.

A few hundred kilometre away, state industries minister Narayan Rane, while addressing a gathering in Sawantwadi also chose to make Modi the target, calling him a "vinaashpurush" (one who destroys) rather than a "vikaspurush" (one who is dedicated to development).