Guwahati, March 30 (IANS): Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) national president J P Nadda during his election rallies on Tuesday said that Narendra Modi government has established long lasting peace in Assam and embarked on a new era of growth and development.
Addressing three election rallies at Dhamapur (Nalbari district), Bilasipara (Dhubri) and Rani (Kamrup), Nadda claimed that during the Congress regime thousands of civilians and security personnel were killed but the Modi government along with Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal-led government have totally controlled the terrorism and violence.
He said that after the Bodo accord last year, over 4,000 extremists of various outfits have surrendered to the government and deposited over 5,000 arms.
Strongly criticising the Congress, the BJP president said that Rahul Gandhi's photographs were tagged with the tea gardens of Sri Lanka and Taiwan instead of Assam. "The Congress had also supported the Toolkit campaign which defamed Indian and Assam tea," he said.
Slamming the political ideology of the Congress, Nadda said, "The party (Congress) is fighting against the Left parties in Kerala while is hand in glove with them in West Bengal with the sole motive of defeating the BJP. It has forged alliance with the religious based political parties."
Nadda said that during the Congress led UPA regime, Assam had received INR 80,000 crore from the 13th Finance Commission while during the Prime Minister Narendra Modi's governance, Assam got INR 1.55 lakh crore from the 14th Finance Commission besides many mega projects started and completed in the state.
Modifying over a hundred years old British era Forest Act, he said that the Modi government withdrew the tree tag from bamboo to boost the bamboo-based industry and empower lakhs of artisans across the northeastern region.
Explaining the BJP's manifesto, Nadda said that to empower the women under Assam's biggest flagship scheme "Orunodoi", the monthly payments of Rs 830 would be increased to Rs 3,000 covering 30 lakh deserving families.
"To make Assam self sufficient in production of essential produce, "Assam Aahar Atmanirbharta Yojana" would be launched which would drive the state towards self sufficiency in essential food items within the next five years," he said adding that two lakh government jobs would also be provided to the youths of Assam every year.
The BJP leader said that to strengthen and protect 'Namghars' and 'Satras' (traditional Vaishnavite monasteries of Assam), grants of INR 2.5 lakh to 12,000 such traditional institutes. Introduced by Mahapurush Srimanta Sankardeva "Namghars", literally meaning prayer house, are places for congregational worship associated with the entire Assamese community and the Ekasarana sect of Hinduism, in particular, which is native to Assam.
Nadda also said that during the Congress rule, poachers killed rhino indiscriminately but after the BJP came to power, the poaching of the endangered animals stopped completely.