Mumbai: UPA Chairperson Sonia Gandhi on Friday launched a direct attack against the Modi government, alleging that freedom of the people was "under systematic and sustained assault" as provocative statements from the ruling establishment were neither random nor accidental but "part of a dangerous design".

Delivering the keynote address at the India Today Conclave 2018 here, the former Congress President said, all that was being done by attempts to rewrite history, falsifying facts and attacking nation builders. "Our society, our freedom all are now under systematic and sustained assault. Make no mistake about it. This is a well sort out project long in the making to refashion the very idea of India," Gandhi said.

"The freedom to think for oneself and differ and degree and to meet or marry according to ones wishes all this and more are under attack. Provocative statements from the ruling establishment are not random or accidental. They are part of a dangerous design," she said and added that vigilante mobs and private armies have been let loose with state patronage.

She said callous remarks were being made about changing the Constitution of the country that "point to a deliberate attempt to subvert the very essence of India".

She asserted that it was not in her nature to be a "voice of gloom and doom but we need to see things the way they are". She spoke about the violence against Dalits and minorities saying there was "shocking insensitivity to atrocities on Dalits".

"Society has been polarised with an eye for winning elections. Religious tensions are being fueled."

Gandhi also took a dig at Modi for his frequent coining of acronyms in the name schemes and government programmes.

"We need to move fast, but fast, F.A.S.T., cannot stand for First Act, Second Think. Acronymising can be contagious," she said to laughter from the audience.

"India is a great country, a wonderful country, let us protect it, cherish it," Gandhi said, ending her speech to a loud applause.

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Hyderabad (PTI): During the last 11 months, the Congress government in Telangana has reversed an air of gloom and despair under the previous BRS regime and ended the "darkness", Chief Minister A Revanth Reddy said on Saturday.

He was responding to a post by Prime Minister Narendra Modi that under Congress rule developmental trajectory and fiscal health is turning from bad to worse in Himachal Pradesh, Karnataka and Telangana.

“I am happy to clarify several misconceptions and factual errors in your statements about my state and our government," Reddy said in his post.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi Friday in a series of posts said the Congress stands "badly exposed" in front of people for promising to them what the party knows it will never be able to deliver.

“Every promise made by us to people is a sacred commitment for us. In the last 11 months, we have reversed an air of gloom & despair under BRS, and ended the darkness. Like a morning sun, Telangana is now Rising,” Reddy said in the post addressed to Modi.

Within two days of taking charge, the Telangana government fulfilled its first and second promise - free bus travel for women across all government buses, and a healthcare and hospitalisation cover of 10 lakhs under Rajiv Aarogyasree, the CM pointed out.

Even before completion of first year of rule, the Congress government has implemented India's largest ever, state-level farmer loan waiver of Rs 18,000 crore covering over 22 lakh farmers, he said responding to PM’s comments that in Telangana, farmers are awaiting the (loan) waiver they were promised.

Women get free electricity, with no domestic power charge for their homes up to 200 units, Reddy noted.

The CM also claimed that his government has held the largest recruitment drive and is regularly holding exams of all levels and provided jobs to over 50,000 eligible youth, a record “unmatched by any BJP state government.”

The CM said the government is rejuvenating River Musi, which was allegedly neglected by the previous government and protecting lakes and other precious water bodies, encroached upon and destroyed wantonly with abandon in the last 10 years.