Rahul Gandhi

trained in lying by the RSS

Mulayam Singh Yadav

HAMIRPUR: Congress vice presidentsaid on Monday that he was keen to see his younger sister Priyanka take a role in active politics, but the decision was up to her. “I trust my sister more than anybody else. I’d like her to be actively involved in politics, but it’s up to her to decide when, how and if she wants to do it,” he said in an exclusive interview to TOI.Attacking Prime Minister Modi for being “insensitive” to farmers, Gandhi accused him of being “”. Referring to the PM as a “selfie-taking, false promise-making machine,” he predicted a communal turn to the UP polls – “because the BJP-RSS combine is capable of dishing out nothing but violence and hate”.Denying the possibility of a coalition with BSP, and saying that Congress forming a government in UP was the “best case scenario,” Gandhi said bothand Mayawati would soon be rendered “unsaleable”. He added, “A lot of problems assailing UP are because of the politics of division. The massive centralization of power, where one person, or four people, rule an entire state cannot work. I believe that the Congress has the power to transform UP. If we can convince the people that it can be done, UP can be pulled out of the morass it has been in.”On Prashant Kishor ’s role in the party’s UP campaign, Gandhi said, “The party strategy is devised by Congress leaders. Prashant operationalizes campaigns, manages part of the logistics and provides inputs. The Congress has a well-established system of distributing tickets. That is the system that will be put to use.”On the campaign trail, Gandhi has been harping on acute farm distress and the Centre’s inability to provide succour. He said, “If BJP is saying that our idea of a loan waiver is a bad habit, then a Rs 1.10 lakh crore waiver for a handful of industrialists is a bad habit too. Our aim is to pressure Modiji into accepting that if he must help the rich, he must assist the poor as well. They must be given the same treatment.”