Two days before the first round of Lok Sabha polls, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi and Samajwadi Party President Akhilesh Yadav held Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the Bharatiya Janata Party to account for the alleged corrupt practices in the electoral bond scheme.
Addressing the first joint press conference with the SP head after the INDIA alliance was forged, Mr Gandhi described PM Modi as the “champion of corruption”. At the same time, Mr Yadav said the “moral bubble” of the BJP had gone bust after the revelations in the electoral bond scheme . “The wind that starts from Ghaziabad today will sweep the BJP away from the State. Ghaziabad se lekar Ghazipur tak safaya hoga. NDA will be defeated by PDA ,” he declared, referring to the party’s agenda to bring together backwards, Dalits and minorities.
Calling the scheme an extortion racket, Mr Gandhi alleged that an analysis of the scheme showed that those who got the government contracts bought the bonds within a few days of the contract. The CBI-ED inquiry was withdrawn against those who invested in electoral bonds. “It is called extortion on the streets,” he charged. Mr Yadav said the way the BJP was bringing the corrupt under its umbrella, it shows the party has become the “godown of corruption.”
