Kickstarting the BJP’s campaign for the 2023 Assembly elections in Karnataka, Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai said that the popularity and strength of the Congress is waning with each day in India.
Addressing a convention of BJP workers at B.C. Road, near Mangaluru, on April 13 after winding up his three-day tour of Dakshina Kannada and Udupi districts, Mr. Bommai said that the Congress is disconnected from the people and their minds.
“Has the more-than-a-century-old Congress become old and outdated? Is it facing any internal trouble? I do not know.” The CM said that the way some leaders of the Congress speak does not match the dignity of a grand old party.
“BJP workers now command higher respect than Congress workers. The BJP now has the highest number elected representatives in India. It indicates that the party has the mandate of the people. Hence, it has got a greater responsibility to serve the people. The widespread grassroots workers are the pillars of the BJP,” Mr. Bommai said.
Lauding party workers of the coastal belt, Mr. Bommai said that their skills and work are an inspiration to BJP workers elsewhere in Karnataka. The party workers in the coastal belt were the pioneers in organising and building the base of the BJP in Karnataka. “What people in coastal districts think today, Karnataka will do it tomorrow,” he said.
Hence, the Chief Minister said, the government is focusing on comprehensive development of the coastal belt through various initiatives, particularly relating to the marine and fisheries sectors.
The aim of the party is to create permanent voters for the BJP in the coastal belt though it has got the support of a majority of people in the region. “This aim (creating permanent voters) of the party applies only to the coastal belt, and not to other districts,” he said without elaborating further.
“The Union Government led by the Prime Minister Narendra Modi has rolled out various welfare schemes. The party can take up a drive to ascertain whether those schemes are reaching to the targeted section of the population. If party workers meet the beneficiaries of the schemes, the party can establish a better relation with the people, and such beneficiaries can become the permanent voters of the BJP,” he said.
