Nihalgarh (Amethi), Nov. 9: Sonia Gandhi today broke a six-month lull in attacks on the Samajwadi Party, saying Uttar Pradesh couldn’t progress without a change of government.

Sonia, whose party props up the Mulayam Singh Yadav government with outside support, alleged she found it tough to help her constituency, Rae Bareli, develop because of political games played by the Samajwadis.

“Whatever development work has taken place in this part of Uttar Pradesh so far is due to my own initiative?. The government that was formed here a few years ago is more into politics than development,” she said. “I believe without a change of government, no progress of the state can start.”

The new aggression from the Congress president, who had since May been refraining from criticising the state government, comes at a time when her own party is under a cloud following the Volcker Committee’s charges over the Iraq oil programme.

Coming a day before the state Congress launches an agitation against the Mulayam government, the attack perked up party leaders such as Salman Khursheed.

“Her attack on the state government was cheered by people at the rally,” the state Congress chief said. Other leaders indicated that after the Bihar polls conclude in the middle of this month, the focus will shift to Uttar Pradesh, which is set for Assembly elections in early 2007.

Mulayam was away in Bihar campaigning for the polls, but Samajwadi Party state secretary Ram Saran Das said: “Sonia Gandhi’s speech contains a threat to topple the state government. The Congress is trying to create an atmosphere of unrest in the state.”

Sonia today inaugurated the four-compartment Life Line Express, a mobile railway hospital that will travel across the state providing free treatment to the rural poor. The service, born under the initiative of Amethi MP Rahul Gandhi, will start from Nihalgarh, which falls in his constituency.

Rahul, who was at the programme, fired a few salvos of his own.

“You all know how difficult it is to improve the state of health affairs in the state. Most of the hospitals don’t have doctors manning them? and what kind of health service they provide is known to every villager. But I am trying to change the scenario by my modest initiative,” he said.

From Amethi, Sonia visited her constituency where she inaugurated a telecom unit.