Vijayapura (Karnataka) (PTI): Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Friday took potshots at Prime Minister Narendra Modi over his attack on the grand old party, saying he is scared and may even shed tears on the stage.

“You have heard the Prime Minister’s speeches. He is scared. It’s possible that he may shed tears on stage,” Gandhi said addressing a public gathering in this district headquarters town in the party-governed State.

Modi has targeted the Congress on a variety of issues in recent campaign rallies, including "mangalsutra", "redistribution of wealth" and "inheritance tax" charges.

The former Congress chief accused Modi of 'diverting public attention' through various means.

“Modi tries to divert your attention. Sometimes he talks about China and Pakistan, and sometimes he will make you beat plates and ask you to switch on the torch light of your mobile phones,” Gandhi said.

He pointed out that there are three to four core issues in India including poverty, unemployment and price rise.

Gandhi claimed that only Congress can eradicate unemployment, contain price rise and give people their due share.

“Modi has only snatched money from poor people. He has made some billionaires. There are 22 people who have wealth equivalent to the 70 crore people of the country. Just one per cent people are controlling 40 per cent of the wealth of the nation,” he alleged.

Gandhi said in the present scheme of things, there is "no scope" for Dalits, OBCs, tribals, minorities and poor general category people.

“I will just tell you a clear thing in a simple one line. The wealth Modi has given to those billionaires, the same money we are going to give to the poor people of the country,” he added.

The Congress leader also promised the youth that his party will scrap the ‘Agniveer’ scheme if it is voted to power.

He dubbed the ‘Agniveer’ scheme in the armed forces offering three years services to the youth from 18 years to 21 years as an insult to the Army and soldiers.

“Narendra Modi snatched the Army jobs from the youth of India. He brought the Agniveer scheme, which is an insult to the Indian Army and soldiers. We will scrap it,” Gandhi said.

Gandhi charged Modi with imposing a faulty GST where he introduced five different types of tax, which are hefty.

Alleging that the PM was doing injustice to Karnataka, he said the Congress will change the GST and rectify the injustice meted out to the people of the state.

According to Gandhi, the ongoing Lok Sabha election was not general in nature. “It is not an election that used to happen earlier because for the first time in the history of India, a party and a person want to destroy the Constitution and democracy."

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Jaipur (PTI): A student preparing for the NEET examination allegedly committed suicide by hanging himself in a rented room in Rajasthan's Sikar on Friday, police said.

According to the police, the student allegedly hanged himself from a ceiling fan using his sister's scarf while one sister was attending coaching classes and the other was in the bathroom.

He had appeared in the NEET UG exam 2026, which was cancelled due to paper leak, they said.

Udyog Nagar SHO Rajesh Kumar said that the deceased, identified as Pradeep Meghwal, was a resident of Kanika ki Dhani village in Jhunjhunu's Gudha Gaudji area.

He had been living in a rented room in Sikar's Jaldhari Nagar area with his two sisters while preparing for NEET over the last three years.

His elder sister later found him hanging and informed the landlord and police after bringing him down, officials said.

The SHO said the body was kept at SK Hospital mortuary, and a postmortem had not been conducted.

The student's father, Rajesh Kumar Meghwal, told police that Pradeep's NEET examination had gone well and the family was expecting him to score around 650 marks.

Former Rajasthan deputy chief minister Sachin Pilot expressed grief over the incident and linked it to anxiety among students after reports of irregularities and paper leaks in NEET 2026.

Pilot said repeated paper leak incidents and cancellation of examinations were affecting students' mental health and demanded a time-bound investigation and strict action against those responsible.