assembly-elections

Updated: Oct 17, 2019 16:37 IST

With Maharashtra election campaign entering slog overs, Prime Minister Narendra Modi attacked the Opposition from Parli in Beed district criticizing its leaders for their stand on the abrogation of Article 370 from Jammu and Kashmir.

“We removed Article 370 for the country, and not for politics,” the Prime Minister said adding that whenever Article 370 is discussed in the future, every person who’s made fun of the decision, who has stood against and challenged it, would be discussed. The Prime Minister was addressing the first of his three rallies in the state that goes to polls in October 21. His other two rallies are in Satara and Pune later in the day.

Follow highlights of PM Modi’s rallies in Maharashtra here

Pankaja Munde, minister in state cabinet and daughter of late party leader Gopinath Munde, is locked in a tough fight from Parli against her cousin Dhananjay, who is contesting on a Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) ticket.

Attacking the Congress, the PM said a Congress leader had said that by removing Article 370, we had lost Kashmir entirely. “A Congress leader had said,this decision will destroy the country,it’s been 3 months,has the country been destroyed?Another Congress leader said that we’ve lost Kashmir by abrogating Article 370,have we lost Kashmir? If you want to go to Kashmir let me know, I’ll make arrangements,” the Prime Minister said

Urging voters to punish the Congress for it ‘misdoings’, the PM said : “ The country can see through their scams and their fake remarks now. The country will punish them for their misdoings when the time comes, but Maharashtra has got the first opportunity to do it.”

Pitching for the re-election of the Sena-BJP combine in the state, PM Modi said, “Today, if the whole state is behind the BJP-Shiv Sena government, its because of the hard work we’ve put in in the last five years. On one side, there is the work-ethic of the current government, and on the other is the selfishness of the Congress-NCP leaders.”

Earlier, Prime Minister Modi on his arrival went straight to Vaidyanath temple and then to the rally venue. The rally in Satara, which will also vote for Lok Sabha bypoll apart from the assembly elections, is scheduled for 4 pm. The bypoll was necessitated after former NCP leader and Chhatrapati Shivaji’s descendant Udayanraje Bhosale resigned from his membership and joined the Bharatiya Janata Party.

For the assembly polls, a high pitched battle is on cards at South Karad in Satara district where former chief minister Prithviraj Chavan is locked in a straight fight with BJP nominee Atul Bhosale.

Karad South is among the 288 Assembly constituencies of Maharashtra where Congress has never tasted defeat since its inception. The BJP this time has given a tough fight by fielding Atul Bhosale, who was president of the Pandharpur’s Vithal-Rukmini Temple Samiti and enjoyed a rank of a Minister of State.

Modi third public rally is in the evening in Pune where BJP hopes to repeat its 2014 performance of winning all eight assembly segments in the city. The successive victories post 2014 – be it Pune and Pimpri-Chinchwad Municipal polls or 2019 Lok Sabha elections – has shown BJP’s confidence in Pune is high. The party currently has 100 per cent representation in Pune through all eight assembly segments.