"I Understand All These Tricks" In PM Modi's Speeches, Says Ashok Gehlot

Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot on Sunday said he understands the trickery used by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in his speeches as he has been in politics for long.

During his address at a programme organised at the Rajasthan College here, the Congress leader said Prime Minister Modi would begin his speech with the words "my friend Ashok Gehlot" and then subject his government to harsh criticism.

He called it his "cleverness".

Referring to Prime Minister Modi's speech delivered virtually at a railway programme organised here on April 12, Gehlot said, "The prime minister had recently joined a VC (video-conference) from Delhi.... He started his speech saying 'my friend Ashok Gehlot'. And they will do whatever they want with my government (meri sarkar ki aisi ki taisi karenge). This is cleverness." The veteran leader said after Modi's speech, he had tagged the prime minister in a tweet and said he had sounded the election bugle.

"I understand all these tricks.... I too have been doing politics for a long time," he said.

The Congress leader pointed out that Prime Minister Modi had himself said in Mangarh that when he was the (Gujarat) chief minister, Ashok Gehlot was the seniormost among all the chief ministers in the country.

"When I am senior, the prime minister should take my advice and implement the Old Pension Scheme (OPS) across the country," he said.

"Implement the OPS.... This is the first advice to you.... The scheme we have made for Rajasthan, you should implement it for the country," he added.

Gehlot accused Modi and Union Home Minister Amit Shah of creating a new model in the country's politics of toppling elected governments through "horse trading", such as in Karnataka, Maharashtra, Goa and Manipur.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)