“NYAY” of Congress is Rahul Gandhi’s promise to fool voters: MP Rajeev Chandrasekhar

MyNation spoke to Rajeev Chandrasekhar, a BJP leader and a Member of Parliament who highlighted the BJP’s achievements in the past five years, which had not been done in over 65 years under the Congress regime. 

What do you have to say regarding the Congress’s plan to “eradicate poverty” under the NYAY scheme?

RAJEEV CHANDRASEKHAR: The Congress has been trying to do this just to hoodwink the poor for the last 65 years. It is not the first time that the Congress has come up with a slogan and is not the first member of the dynastic family that has tried to do this - which is to fool the poor with a slogan. It was so far “Gareebi Hatao”, but now they believed now that they needed a new slogan and called it ‘NYAY’. The only people who get justice from the first family of the Congress with all of their poverty schemes of the last 65 years are all those middlemen, cronies and friends of the Congress that enrich themselves from these schemes that are ostensibly for the poor, funded by the taxes of the middle class, but ended up only helping a few people close to the first family of the Congress. So I think Rahul Gandhi is belatedly, as he sees his graph sink in these elections, pulling out one more of his fake rabbits out of his fake hat and the people will dismiss it as yet another ‘Rahulism’ and Rahul is become very famous for his ‘Rahulism’.

What the poor of India realize and now fully well, is that the last five years, Prime Minister Modi has built back the economy, and on the back of that has created a platform to deliver subsidies without corruption - which is a direct benefit transfer. Money reaches the poor and their bank accounts directly and these benefits that the government under Prime Minister Modi has given is now more than one lakh rupees per year, per family. So, Rahul Gandhi’s promises of 72,000 is already short of what the Prime Minister's already achieved. The next five years I am very sure as the manifesto is released of the BJP, the Prime Minister will lay out what else he is going to do, to permanently eradicate poverty. For the BJP, poverty is not a slogan, poverty is not a constituency of people to fool and use as a Vote Bank. Poverty is a challenge to address and solve so that all of those people can come out of the lines of poverty and look forward to a life of dignity and prosperity. That is what the Prime Minister and BJP will offer. The Congress is basically lying. They have lied for 65 years, and they want to just try and see if they can do one more member of the family, can perpetuate that whole family tradition of lying about the poor and helping the poor.

What can you tell us about Mission Shakti and The BJP’s active role in it?

RAJEEV CHANDRASEKHAR: It is not a program of the BJP. Today is a day where every Indian should be proud, because it is a day where India has demonstrated to the world that it can secure itself not just on land, air and sea, as we have demonstrated in the past, but also the fact that we can reach space, if need be to protect ourselves. It is a signal to nations who plan to use space against India. This is a great day for the scientists of ISRO and the DRDO who have contributed tremendously to make this a reality and to the political leadership and the determination of Prime Minister Modi that made this technology demonstration a reality.

ALSO WATCH: Rahul Gandhi continues Congress’s legacy of hoodwinking poor: Rajeev Chandrasekhar

How can the BJP ensure that it secures the vote bank in the Bangalore South Constituency?

RAJEEV CHANDRASEKHAR: These are the Lok Sabha elections, as you know, and every voter whether in Bangalore South or Patna or any other constituency in India today, knows that their vote is being cast for who is going to be the Prime Minister. So, it really is not very relevant whether it is Tejasvi Surya or Tejaswini Ananth Kumar or whoever the candidate is. The voters know today that they are voting for Narendra Modi.

In the coalition, how will the NDA ensure that MLAs / MPs don’t jump ships?

RAJEEV CHANDRASEKHAR: In the NDA there are many parties. Each party elects its MPs and the MPs are bound by the anti-defection law and those laws apply to whether they are NDA MP or you know Mahamilawat MP or Congress MP.  I am confident today, as is the Prime Minister and the BJP leadership, that there will be more than adequate MPs, more than 300 MPs who will be elected on the BJP plank and Prime Minister Modi’s plank of development and prosperity for all Indians.

Do you think that the JD(S) is involved in increasing the number of Sumalathas in the Mandya constituency?

RAJEEV CHANDRASEKHAR: The BJP has already declared that it is supporting Sumalatha, wife of late Ambareesh, as a mark of respect for late Ambareesh. That is our position and that is a position indeed of almost every man,  woman and child who is a voter in Mandya. They believe that the memory of Ambareesh and the legacy of Ambareesh must be preserved and must continue through Sumalatha.They are completely upset that Kumaraswamy is using the death of Ambareesh almost as an opportunity to create an extension of his dynasty in Mandya.

Do you think that the Mahaghatbadhan would meet the same fate as the Karnataka’s coalition government?

RAJEEV CHANDRASEKHAR: The simplest answer to that is that the BJP is very clear who it’s Prime Minister will be. It is clear, transparent and honest with the people of India. Prime Minister Modi is our Prime Ministerial Candidate. This so called Mahamilawat, and we don't call it Mahagathbandhan. Mahamilawat because it is a group of parties which have nothing in common except being dynasty parties, who don't even know who their leader is. So, you are a resident of Bengaluru and you know, for example, what the BBMP has done to Bangalore. The BBMP is a coalition between the Congress and JDS for the last three years. Now, imagine that on a national scale where everybody is looting, everybody is exploiting, everybody is making money, what everybody is doing is this narrow political game. And nobody cares about the people, nobody cares about the voter, and nobody cares about the country.

Do you think the Congress is using the same narrative while accusing a BJP member of possessing a diary?

RAJEEV CHANDRASEKHAR: I've said this many times and I've been saying this since 2017 December that the Congress has perfected a strategy that they have learnt in the classrooms of Cambridge Analytica. When you are confronted with an issue, for which you don't have an answer and you're on the backfoot, quickly change the topic and the narrative to something else. So, when you are confronted with the son-in-law’s corruption, talk about pro-poverty. When you are confronted with a real diary with the names of SG, RG, AP, MV, cook up another diary. So, this is a strategy of the Congress. Some people may fall for that strategy but I think most Indians don't. Increasingly media is seeing through it. In the early days even the media was, in a sense falling for it. But that is their strategy. Divert attention from the truth. Use a lie to divert the attention. People are now saying, “That is a lie. Get back to the truth.”

BS Yeddyurappa had said that the BJP is confident of winning 22/28 Lok Sabha seats and would soon form the government. Is that true?

RAJEEV CHANDRASEKHAR: Let us be clear about one thing. The government that is in Karnataka today does not enjoy the mandate. The Congress in 2018 election was rejected by the people. JD(S) had nothing close to a mandate. Two negative mandates don't come together and create a positive mandate. So, there is no doubt in anybody's mind that this government is not a government voted for, by the people. This is a government has been glued together by the mutual love of corruption and nepotism. So, what Mr. Yeddurappa was saying is not what he himself was thinking, he's only reflecting what the vast majority of people in Karnataka think.

Would Yeddyurappa then be the Chief Minister?

RAJEEV CHANDRASEKHAR: Mr. Yeddurappa is our party president, he is our leader and he took us into the 2018 election. We had significant performance in 2018 election we fell short with a few seats. He's our leader and I see no reason for that to change.

What are the issues with which the BJP will go into polls?

RAJEEV CHANDRASEKHAR: This issue for BJP is clearly the performance and the track record of Prime Minister Narendra Modi over the last five Years. We believe that the report card of PM Modi whether it is on the issue of the economy, the issue of poverty alleviation, issue of security , is a report card that is worthy of the people of India. It is purely on the development record that Prime Minister Modi is seeking reelection. It is because there are no answers to that report card that the opposition keep raising useless issues.

Read Exclusive COVID-19 Coronavirus News updates, at MyNation.