BJP dismisses Opposition parties’ wishes for 2024 polls

The BJP on Thursday took a swipe at Opposition parties over their meeting in Bihar on June 23, saying they may be looking for support in each other but their wish will wash away in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls like the Rs 1,750-crore bridge which collapsed in the state recently.
Union Minister and party leader Smriti Irani also targeted the Congress over Rahul Gandhi’s claim of running “mohabbat ki dukan” (shop of love) and asked if this “mohabbat” meant denouncing the Hindu way of life, killing of Sikhs, partnering with those who wish ill for India and seeking outside intervention to harm India’s democracy.
“What kind of love is this which is not for the country but for your politics. It does not say anything when ‘Kerala Story’ is shown,” she said at a press conference.
Does this love not extend to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, she asked, lauding his spirit of “service”, and added that she will be surprised if the Congress has any kind word for him.
“It is incumbent upon the Congress to attack the image of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The ‘mohabbat’ of the Congress doesn’t extend to him,” the union minister for women and child development said.
Hitting back at Gandhi’s charge that minorities were not being treated fairly by the government, she said the “Gandhi Khandan” calls itself “protector of minorities” but the expenditure on merit-cum-means scholarship was Rs 860 crore under the Congress-led UPA government while it is Rs 2,691 crore under the Modi government.
On another allocation under the minority affairs ministry, a portfolio she holds, she said it had risen to Rs 31,450 crore now from Rs 12,000 crore under the UPA. These statistics tell the truth about the Congress, Irani said.
With the ruling BJP often accusing the Congress of seeking outside intervention to attack the Modi government, Irani said such activities of the opposition party leadership will increase as the 2024 national polls approach. It is determined to strike a blow to the country’s democratic process in its lust for power, she said.