The Congress and the RJD, both part of the JMM-led alliance government in Jharkhand, have started campaigning for the 2024 Lok Sabha and Assembly polls in the state.

While Congress national president Mallikarjun Kharge launched the party’s Haath Se Haath Jodo campaign at a ground in the Pakur Assembly constituency under Sahebganj district on Saturday afternoon, Bihar deputy chief minister and the RJD senior leader Tejashwi Prasad Yadav met Jharkhand chief minister Hemant Soren in Ranchi on Saturday evening and would hold a meeting with party’s senior leaders on Sunday.

Kharge arrived at Dumka on Saturday through a chartered plane and flew to Pakur on a helicopter to address a rally which would also see the Congress leaders reaching out to every house in Jharkhand as part of a 60-day campaign to create awareness against the BJP’s politics of hatred and highlight problems of inflation, unemployment and Prime Minister Narendra Modi supporting “industrialist friends”.

Addressing a gathering of over 10,000 in the afternoon heat, Kharge continued to criticise the Prime Minister for being silent on the Adani issue and expressed dismay over his remarks being expunged by the Rajya Sabha chairperson.

“There is neither freedom of speech inside Parliament nor outside. Those who dare to speak up are put behind bars. I only raised a few issues and quoted a shayari (Urdu poetry) but they were expunged. I am asking the reason for expunging the texts but nobody is replying,” said Kharge.

“A man whose wealth was Rs 1 lakh crore in 2019, in 2.5 years it became Rs 13 lakh crore. The entire nation’s wealth went into one hand. We raised this issue in Parliament. Instead of giving answers, they (govt) called it unparliamentary,” Kharge said.

“Why is the Modi government not conducting a joint parliamentary committee probe into the allegations against the Adani group? What is the reason behind Modiji and his government not even allowing (anyone) to raise the word Adani in Parliament?” Kharge said.

He also alleged that till now “Modiji has given Rs 82,000 crore of government money to Adani”.

Taking a dig at the BJP over rising inflation, Kharge said it came to power in 2014 with the promise to check inflation, but the price of essential commodities are on the rise ever since it came to power.

The Congress chief further said that it was their party which developed the infrastructure of the country and fought for India’s freedom. He claimed that the railway tracks on which Modiji proudly rolled out the Vande Bharat train were laid during the Congress regime.

Meanwhile, Tejashwi Yadav, who reached Ranchi Airport around 1pm, made it clear that efforts are in place to put a joint opposition to fight the BJP in Jharkhand too.

“All the non-BJP opposition parties have to be mobilised before the elections and fight the elections together. I will meet Hemant Soren ji and discuss certain things,” said Yadav.

Time bombs recovered, 1 arrested

Patna: Bihar Police arrested one person and recovered three sophisticated time bombs and narcotics substances from him in Muzaffarpur district. Two more persons have been detained for questioning in connection with it. The anti-terrorist squad (ATS) and the central security agencies have been alerted about the seizure.

According to the police, the improvised explosive devices (IEDs) fitted with timers and drugs were recovered during a raid conducted in the Mithanpura police station area on the basis of intelligence inputs on Saturday.

“We found three IEDs fitted with electronic timer circuits while searching the house of one Muhammad Javed Ahmad alias Sinhu during the course of our raid in Tinkothia locality of the city. We have arrested him,” Muzaffarpur sub-divisional police officer (town) Raghav Dayal told The Telegraph.

DEV RAJ