Fashion to want to become PM: Sonia

ON A whistle stop tour of West Bengal before the first phase of polls, Congress president Sonia Gandhi not only castigated the Left Front but pointed a finger at the likes of Sharad Pawar, Mayawati and others and said that in Indian politics it seems to have become a fashion to want to become the Prime Minister.
Sonia said there were politicians who drift from one block to the other and keep expressing a desire to become the Prime Minister of the country. She said the likes of Sonia Gandhi and Manmohan Singh are not among such people. They had never eyed the PM’s chair because “our aim is to work for the people”.

Close on the heels of her son Rahul Gandhi putting the Left Front in West Bengal on the dock for non utilization of development funds and not being able to provide 100 days work for the people under the Rojgar Yojna, Sonia went a step further. She said the Left Front had not only misutilized the funds but had done so to serve their own interest. The benefits of Central schemes had not reached the people, she added.

Addressing rallies in Lalgola, Shamsit, Malda and Raigiunj, Sonia asked the Left to go in for introspection. Pointing out that winds of change were blowing in Bengal, she appealed to the people to vote for Congress candidates because it was only the Congress which could provide a strong and stable government at the Centre.

She also lambasted the CPI (M) led Left Front on the Nandigram and Singur issues and said atrocities had been committed on people in the name of development.

In what seemed to be a gesture to tell the electorate how much the poll alliance between the Congress and Trinamool Congress mattered to her, Sonia pulled the chair, where Mamata was about to sit, closer to her in Lalgola in Pranab Mukherjee’s constituency in Jangipur, Murshidabad district. She leaned across and conferred with her. When she took the microphone she said she was happy that Mamata was on the dais with her. She welcomed her decision to have an electoral pact with per party. The last time the two women were seen in a public rally was in 2001.

Mamata too pitched in with a brief speech where she repeated her familiar tirade of the CPI (M) led Left Front.

A security blanket was thrown over the venues which Sonia Gandhi went for the rallies. The police and security agencies were extra cautious because the Congress president was touring areas which border Bangladesh.

Sonia also addressed rallies in Shamsit, Malda North in support of party candidate Mousam Benazir Noor and in Islampur in North Dinajpur district to campaign for Congress candidate for the Raiganj seat Deepa Dasmunshi - wife of ailing Congress leader from Bengal Priya Ranjan Dasmunshi.

Six people were injured, two of them seriously when a branch of a mango tree broke and more than 30 people fell to the ground and on top of other people standing below. A large number of people had climbed the tree to catch a glimpse of Sonia in Shamsit.

After addressing the rally at Islampur, Sonia headed for Bagdogra airport. However, she had to wait at the airport for quite some time before boarding her special aircraft because a MIG of the Indian Air Force had to make an emergency landing.