Rahul Gandhi on Monday accused Prime Minister Narendra Modi of “lying” to the people of Amethi, and said that the ordnance factory in the Congress president’s constituency, where the PM on Sunday launched an India-Russia joint venture for production of AK-203 rifles, was already functioning for the “past many years”.

Addressing a rally in Amethi on Sunday, Modi had said the work at the ordnance factory there had been delayed and the number of jobs promised had not been provided to the local people.

“Mr Prime Minister, I had laid the foundation for the Ordnance Factory in Amethi in 2010. Small arms are being manufactured there for the past many years. You went to Amethi yesterday [Sunday] and spoke lies,” Gandhi tweeted in Hindi.

In his speech, Modi said that Gandhi had promised the work will begin soon at the factory. He asked people why they should believe someone who could not get even this much done during the tenure of his party’s government. “They promised employment to 1,500 people but only 200 got jobs.”

Modi also targeted Gandhi for failing to arrange gas for a steel factory in Amethi and said the same had been done to a food park there. Gandhi, in turn, has been accusing the Modi government of cancelling the food park project.

On Monday, Congress lawmaker Deepak Singh released a picture of Gandhi laying the factory’s foundation stone in December 2007 and added that production had already begun there.

“The Amethi Ordnance Factory was set up in 2010 and is already manufacturing Mac guns and Pennsylvania guns. The Modi government has constructed no building, set up no machine or units. The Prime Minister has lowered the dignity of his office by indulging in petty politics on such issues,” Singh said, adding that the party would hold an exhibition about the development works carried out in Amethi.

But BJP leader Uma Shankar Pandey said the PM’s comments were spot on, and said that Gandhi only laid the foundation stone for the ordnance factory. He added the Congress government was unable to start production there. “We have started work on manufacturing the world’s best AK rifles there.”

India has signed a deal with a Russian firm to manufacture 750,000 AK-203 rifles, the latest derivative of the legendary AK-47 rifles, at the Indian Ordnance Factory at Amethi’s Korwa, defence minister Nirmala Sitharaman had said in Amethi on Sunday. Rahul Gandhi won from the Gandhi bastion in 2014, even as UP was swept by the BJP in the 2014 general elections.

First Published: Mar 04, 2019 22:56 IST