Union Minister Rajiv Ranjan Singh aka Lalan Singh on Friday launched a scathing attack at the Congress and the opposition INDIA alliance in his latest Lok Sabha speech. Using a ludo analogy, Singh said that snake will bite the grand old Congress party at 99 and they will fall down to zero once again.
"The number 99 is very bad in ludo. I don't know whether Gaurav Gogoi and the others have played it or not. They reach 99 in Ludo and when the snake bites, they reach zero," the senior JDU leader said at the floor of the Lower House. He also said that the party will not even be in the contest after 5 years.
The comment was greeted with thunderous applause from MPs on the ruling side. Singh also answered the opposition's charge of the Union Budget 2024-25 was centered on Andhra Pradesh and Bihar as they are key allies in Modi government 3.0.
The opposition also claimed that the two states received enormous allocations so that the BJP could save the government at the Centre. Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced massive sops for the two states in the Union Budget 2024. For Bihar, Sitharaman announced infrastructure projects worth Rs 59,000 crore.
She also announced several road connectivity projects for the state, including the Patna-Purnea Expressway, Buxar-Bhagalpur Expressway, and roads connecting Bodhgaya, Rajgir, Vaishali, and Darbhanga. An additional 2-lane bridge over the Ganga River at Buxar, to be built at a cost outlay of Rs 26,000 crore.
While replying to this, Singh said: "Many parties said that the budget was meant to appease two parties (TDP and JDU) and to save the government. Heard this many times. What is this talk of saving the government?"
He further emphasised that the alliance that the Telugu Desam Party and JDU's alliance with the BJP is a pre-poll alliance, which has a mandate for 5 years. He also did not miss this opportunity to call out the INDIA bloc and recount Janata Dal (United)'s experience with the opposition alliance.
Likening the INDIA alliance to 'vultures', the Union Minister said: "We stayed with you. We've also seen your values in the past how you behave like vultures when in power. We said no more of this and left the INDIA alliance. We fought in a pre-poll alliance and have a mandate for 5 years. You have been clean bowled, dont worry."