Arrest Mulayam and his men: Sonia

Bareilly: Congress President Sonia Gandhi, on Wednesday, urged party workers in Uttar Pradesh to launch a jail bharo (fill the jails) movement to expose what she termed, the corrupt government of Chief Minister Mulayam Singh Yadav.

Sonia Gandhi was addressing a massive rally here as a part of her mission to revive the party in India's most populous state. Congress has been in political oblivion for nearly 16 years in the state, after ruling it for four decades.

This was her second rally outside her own political constituency Rae Bareli.

She had earlier addressed a rally in Kanpur August 8 on the anniversary of the Quit India Day when she virtually launched the party's campaign for assembly elections due early 2007.

Without mincing words on Wednesday, she charged the Mulayam Singh government with perpetuating "chaos and anarchy".

"Utter chaos and anarchy prevails in the state. Criminals are ruling and atrocities were being committed on the Dalits and underprivileged with impunity, while the powers-that-be are busy filling their coffers," she told a responsive gathering.

She even went to the extent of referring to Uttar Pradesh and Mulayam Singh Yadav as Andher Nagari, Chaupat Raja (an anarchical state with a good-for-nothing king).

"We must go for mass voluntary arrests and fill up the jails of Uttar Pradesh to expose this corrupt government," she told the crowds amid cheers.

"We need to ask this government how it has spent all the funds given by the centre. The people have a right to ask how the government was spending the tax-payer's money," she said.

"It was a tragedy that the government was oblivious of the fact that farmers were feeling oppressed, the youth were frustrated, there was no availability of power, industries were shutting down and the law and order was deteriorating day by day," she lamented.

The Congress Chief wondered how Mulayam was busy trying to make people believe that Uttar Pradesh had become Uttam Pradesh (the best state).

"Far from Uttam, Uttar Pradesh was fast turning into Ulta Pradesh (a topsy-turvy state)," she added.

Reminding the crowd about the state's rich political heritage, she said, "Uttar Pradesh had given the nation top patriots including Jawaharlal Nehru, who was also lodged by the British in the Barielly jail here. The people of the state need to rise and fight against a regime that was meting out the same kind of injustice and subjecting them to similar atrocities."

In an obvious bid to blow her own trumpet, Sonia Gandhi also went about proclaiming what the United Progressive Alliance Government at the Centre was doing for the larger good of "farmers, the downtrodden and other weaker sections of society".

Clearly conscious of the presence of a large Muslim population in this region, she displayed utmost caution while referring to the menace of terrorism.

"Terrorism is a crime against humanity and we all have to fight back. But we ought to take care that members of any particular community were not singled out or targeted in the name of combating terrorism," she observed.

Rahul Gandhi, who was expected to show up at the rally, did not turn up.