BJP will be wiped out in South, halved in North: Jairam Ramesh on BJP's performance in LS polls

New Delhi: Congress general secretary-in-charge of communications Jairam Ramesh on Friday commented on BJP's performance during the ongoing Lok Sabha elections, saying that BJP will be wiped out in the South and halved in the North.

Jairam Ramesh said, "Today, voting for 88 constituencies in the second phase of the 18th Lok Sabha elections across 13 states and union territories are underway. During the two phases, it is clear that BJP is going to be wiped out in the South and will be halved in the North."

Commenting on JP Nadda's statement that Congress is snatching the rights of SC, ST and OBCs, he said, "This is PM Narendra Modi's agenda of polarisation. We have always said that we want to empower the weak sections of society like SCs, STs, OBCs, minorities, and women. We want rapid economic development in the country and the benefits of it to reach everyone."

"The reality behind BJP's slogan of '400 paar' is that they want to change the constitution... They are against reservation. They want to remove this constitution, and RSS has always been against reservation. The census was supposed to be conducted in 2021, but till now it hasn't been done because a census would have revealed the population of SCs and STs. Our constitution offers reservations based on population. We have no hidden agenda. Our agenda is clearly written in our manifesto...," he added.

On Thursday, Jairam Ramesh had accused Prime Minister Narendra Modi of trying to give a communal angle to the Congress manifesto.

"BJP is in trouble. The PM is baffled. Since April 19, he has been trying to take the whole agenda in a different direction. He tried to give a communal angle to our manifesto, after which, he raised some issues which are not there in our manifesto... He is publicising our manifesto during his election rallies. Even though this publicity is wrong, it is based on lies, still, this is the first time that the PM is publicising the opposition's manifesto," he said.

The Congress leader challenged the PM's claim that their manifesto talks about wealth redistribution, stating that there is not one word in their 50-page manifesto that hints at wealth redistribution.

"The PM says that our manifesto talks about wealth redistribution. I challenge him that in our 50-page manifesto, there is not one word that hints at wealth redistribution," he added.