Congress' 'Parivartan Yatra' in Haryana got tremendous public response: Ghulam Nabi Azad
Faridabad: Congress general secretary Ghulam Nabi Azad Sunday exuded confidence of his party winning all 10 Lok Sabha seats from Haryana, saying there was tremendous public response to its 'Parivartan Yatra'.
He claimed that people were "fed up" with the BJP governments at the Centre and in Haryana and were waiting to teach them a lesson in the polls.
Speaking here on the concluding day of the party's six-day long 'Parivartan Yatra', which had started from Gurgaon and criss-crossed the state covering all 10 LS constituencies and 60-70 out of 90 assembly segments, Azad said the party stands united and every party worker and supporter is solidly behind it.
The general secretary in-charge of Haryana also said he was sure that the Congress will stage a comeback in the state assembly as well, which are due later this year.
He called on party workers to take the message of unity to every voter in the state.
During the 'Parivartan Yatra', all the senior leaders from the state, including former chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda, Congress leaders Ajay Singh Yadav, Kiran Choudhary, state Congress chief Ashok Tanwar, besides Azad, travelled together.
Congress president Rahul Gandhi too had joined this Yatra from Jagadhri in Yamunanagar to Karnal when he visited the state Friday.
On the last day, the yatra travelled through Faridabad and Palwal districts.
Azad, who is also the Leader of Opposition in the Rajya Sabha, said the 'Parivartan Yatra' had been successful in its mission of bringing the Congress leadership from the state together, a party release said.
"All the leaders of the state sat together in a rath (high-tech bus), they stayed together, had food together and spoke in one voice and sought votes for each other. Our opponents have been spreading a false propaganda that our party is divided into factions. We got wonderful support from the people and this can be estimated from the fact that the yatra started at 9 pm and was supposed to finish at 7 pm, but went on way past midnight," he said.
Talking about the political mood in the state, Azad said "every section of the society-- farmers, youth, women, government employees, is keen to avenge the massive misgovernance in the state through their vote".
"The BJP has served only lies to the people of the state over the last five years. The BJP had promised to implement the Swaminathan Commission report, provide two crore jobs a year, give 15 lakh to everyone after bringing back black money from abroad, but they forgot all about these issues after gaining power. All they have done in the last five years is rename all Congress schemes and take credit for our achievements," he said.
"The people of Haryana have understood the BJP's political strategy of their lies, loot and dividing the society along caste and communal lines and will not fall prey to these tricks again. On the other hand, the Congress believes in taking all sections along and social harmony is on top of our political agenda," Azad said.
Farm loans will be waived and poorest of poor will get Rs 72,000 per annum under the Nyuntam Aay Yojana (NYAY) scheme when the Congress forms the next government at the Centre, he said.
Hooda said all party leaders have come together under the leadership of the Congress president and Azad, and added that the party will win all the 10 Lok seats in the state.
He claimed that the success of the 'Parivartan Yartra' has "shaken up the BJP and the INLD and the way people of the state have welcomed the Yatra is an indicator of the fact that the Congress lives in the hearts of the people of the state".
"When the Congress government was elected to office in 2005, people of Faridabad used to say that the then INLD-BJP government had turned Faridabad into Fakirabad (backward). We came to power and changed that as we restored glory to Faridabad," the former chief minister said.
Let the Truth be known. If you read VB and like VB, please be a VB Supporter and Help us deliver the Truth to one and all.
Two injuries, one DNF, a DQ as India end messy World Relays campaign
Gaborone (Botswana) (PTI): Amoj Jacob and Ragul Kumar got injured during the men's 4x400m and 4x100 races respectively as India ended their World Athletics Relays campaign in disappointment on the second day of competitions here on Sunday.
The Indian camp had high hopes of making the 2027 World Championships in the men's 4x400m relay but the team did not finish (DNF) the race as Jacob suffered cramps and pulled out of the race after taking the baton from the first leg runner Dharamveer Choudhary. Rajesh Ramesh and Vishal TK were to run in the third and fourth legs.
Those teams which could not qualify for the 2027 Beijing World Championships by reaching the final round of each of the six relay events on Saturday were given another chance in the second qualification round on Sunday.
The top two teams in each of the two heats (in all six relay events) booked the Beijing ticket on Sunday.
India will now have to try and qualify for the World Championships through the Top Lists of the World Athletics, which is a long and tedious process.
In the men's 4x100m race, third leg runner Ragul Kumar fell down the track after failing to hand over the baton inside the exchange zone to fourth leg runner Gurindervir Singh, which clearly showed the lack of coordination among the runners.
Harsh Santosh Raut and Animesh Kujur ran the first two legs.
The Indian quartet was disqualified and Kumar was seen being taken away from the Field of Play with the help of the volunteers.
It was a comedy of errors in the case of the women's 4x100m race, which saw the baton being dropped during an exchange between first leg runner Tamanna and second runner Nithya Gandhe, though the Indians finished the race in 53.09 seconds.
Gandhe started running quite a distance, but after realising that the baton was not in her hand, she turned and ran back to pick it up.
The only silver-lining for the Indian contingent was the national record time in the mixed 4x100m relay race, though the quartet of Ragul Kumar, Nithya Gandhe, Animesh Kujur and Sneha SS finished sixth in heat number two with a time of 41.35 seconds, bettering the previous national mark of 42.30 seconds set in March in Chandigarh.
The mixed 4x400m relay quartet of Theerthesh P Shetty, Kumari Saloni, Nihal William and Rashdeep Kaur ended at fifth in heat number one with a time of 3 minutes and 19.40 seconds.
On Saturday, all the five Indian relay teams had failed to make it to the respective final rounds and thus missed out on the 2027 World Championships berths.
