THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Congress president Rahul Gandhi accused Prime Minister Narendra Modi of politicising Indian Army’s victories. "When Pulwama took place, my immediate reaction was 'I'm not going to politicise this issue'. This is not a political issue. I refuse to exploit our jawans politically. But that is not how the prime minister thinks. The prime minister exploits the valour of our jawans politically for his own good. And if the army and air force do something, the credit is theirs. It is shameful that the prime minister doesn't give them credit, because they're the people who give their blood. They deserve the credit and nobody else," he said while addressing the election rally at Central Stadium in Thiruvananthapuram on Tuesday.

Addressing a rally in Thiruvananthapuram, Congress president Rahul Gandhi said, "We understand that hatred hurts India. Division hurts India. Love, united strengthens India. You've seen the BJP government for five years. Their slogan was 'acche din ayenge'. Today we have the highest unemployment rate in 45 years, the highest suicide rate of farmers.

He targeted businessman Anil Ambani and the Centre over Rafale deal. "His (Anil Ambani) brother had to pay his debts to keep him out of jail but for some reason he was given the biggest defence contract in the world," he said.

Rahul Gandhi lashed out at Prime Minister Narendra Modi over Rafale deal and claimed that Modi failed to answer his questions on the agreement. "He didn't mention Rafale or Anil Ambani (in Modi's response in the Parliament). The old slogan was 'ache din ayenge', the new slogan is 'chowkidar chor hai'."

"Narendra Modi demonetised the economy, we will remonetise the economy. Frankly, there's no other choice other than remonetising the economy," Rahul Gandhi said while addressing the public meeting .

Happy to see Tharoor back in action, says Rahul

Congress MP Shashi Tharoor suffered head injuries while performing 'Tulabharam' ritual at a temple in Thiruvananthapuram on Monday. Congress president Rahul Gandhi said at the Thiruvananthapuram rally, "I was quite worried when Tharoor got hurt. But I'm happy to see that he's back in action pretty quickly. It tells you about his spirit. He has represented you extremely well in the Parliament. He's an asset to Kerala and to the Congress. So, you have to make sure that he wins the election."

"The Congress will come to power in 2019. NYAY will put the fuel into the Indian economy engine and you will see the impact of the scheme in a couple of months. The vibrancy will come back, and millions of jobs would be created. But we don't want to stop there. We want to aggressively fight unemployment."

He further said: "The truth is we can remonetise the economy and give 22 lakh government jobs, 10 lakh jobs in the panchayats. We want to unleash India's youngsters, we want to free India's job creation army."

Rahul Gandhi said, "The fishermen who saved thousands of lives during floods, who sacrificed everything they had to protect the people, we ask them, what would you like us to do? How can we honour what you've done? We have unique problems. The voice of our brave fishermen is in our manifesto. The moment we win the election, fishermen will have their own ministry in Delhi. All we did was listen to the voice of the Indians."

Rahul said if the Congress came to power, farmers would not be jailed for defaulting loans and for three years opportunity would be given to youths to start new enterprise without conditions or permissions.

He urged people to elect Shashi Tharoor and Adoor Prakash from Thiruvananthapuram and Attingal respectively.

Opposition leader Chennithala said that Rahul is the only leader who can face RSS and BJP and hailed him as the future prime minister of India. He added that he was contesting from Wayanad for India’s unity.

KPCC president Mullapally Ramachandran chaired the function, which was attended by a number of Congress leaders.