Bhubaneswar: Ahead of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Odisha visit on June 2, the Congress today fired a fresh salvo at the saffron party terming its scheduled second anniversary celebration named 'Bikash Utsav' as 'Bakwas Utsav'.
National spokesperson of the grand old party Sobha Oza, while issuing a booklet on the alleged failures of the Modi-government titled 'Sachai Ki Aaina', dubbed the Prime Minister an 'event manager'.
"He (Modi) has remained in the office as an event manager of BJP for the last two years. He is acting as a one-eyed king in a blind State. They (BJP) were talking about zero tolerance on women's exploitation, but torture on women has increased 10 per cent during their rule," Oza said.
The 62-page booklet has featured the NDA government's failures in tackling women's exploitation, agrarian issues leading to farmers' suicides, economy stabilization, black money and torture on dalits.
The principal Opposition party - both at the Centre and in the State - did not spare the Naveen Patnaik-led BJD government in Odisha either.
Odisha Pradesh Congress Committee (OPCC) president Prasad Harichandan, who attended the media conference, made fun of the chief minister dubbing him 'junior Modi' and said both are habituated to spending lavish amounts in their campaigning.
“NaMo and Naveeno. One is senior and another is junior Modi. As much as Rs 27 lakh is being spent in the event management of Modi while it is Rs 10 lakh in case of Naveen. On the other hand, the entire country and States like Odisha are wallowing in failure," Harichandan said.
Both BJP and BJD hit back at the Congress strongly. "Rahul Baba speaks lies. A woman leader from his party, who has held a press conference here, released a book which contains 99 per cent false data," Arun singh, BJP in-charge of Odisha, said.
On its part, BJD claimed that the data provided by Congress on CM's rallies are baseless.
"Congress has made an attempt in vain by clubbing Modi and Naveen's campaigning together. The data they are providing on the rallies of BJD is false and fabricated," said BJD spokesperson Sashi Bhushan Behera.