BJP president Rajnath Singh arrives at the party workers’ meet in Guwahati on Wednesday. Picture by UB Photos

Guwahati, July 3: The BJP today sought a chance to change the face of the Northeast while training its guns on the “misdeeds” of the Congress.

Party president Rajnath Singh set the Assam unit on the course for the general elections at a public meeting here, saying the BJP flag was ready to be unfurled in New Delhi after the hustings.

“Under Congress rule, Assam has become a breeding ground for rampant corruption. The Congress has failed to work for the development of Assam and the Northeast and undone the work we did during our six years in power at the Centre. Give us one more chance and we will open up our coffers for the development of the region. We are always concerned about the Northeast. It was we who set up a separate ministry for development of the region,” Singh said.

With the top brass of the Assam unit in tow, Singh today discussed the preparedness for the Lok Sabha elections.

Singh’s first visit to Assam as party president came in the wake of BJP’s good performance in the recent Guwahati Municipal Corporation (GMC) election, where it won 11 out of 30 wards. Pointing out that the party performance was better than expected, Singh said the result was a clear indication of BJP’s march towards becoming the “number one party” in Assam.

Braving a scorching sun and then rain, over 5,000 BJP workers from across the state listened to Singh, who arrived at the venue at 12.35pm flanked by party national vice-president S.N. Ahluwalia. Senior party leaders like Bijoya Chakravarty, Assam BJP president Sarbananda Sonowal, Prashanta Phukan, Ramen Deka, C.K. Das, Kabindra Purkayastha, Rajen Gohain and Ranjit Dutta among others, attended the meeting.

Regarding the land-swap deal with Bangladesh, Singh said the government should have asked for compensation from the neighbouring country for the land they decided to give away.

Ahluwalia said he would spend the next month in Assam visiting all Lok Sabha and Assembly constituencies to prepare for the general election scheduled for 2014. A party member said the party would try to win at least six seats this time. Last time, BJP had won four of the 14 Lok Sabha seats in Assam.

The party received a shot in the arm today with senior AGP leader Atul Bora joining its ranks. Mukuta Deka, president of the Kamrup district unit, said that 500 people joined the party today, some of whom were from AGP and the ruling Congress. Singh described Bora as a senior leader who had remained untouched by corruption. Bora, on the other hand, said his joining BJP was a new beginning and he had no aspirations of becoming a leader.

“Today I want to make a new beginning. I have not come here to become a leader but to work as a party worker. I’ll never leave the party,” Bora told the audience. Talking to reporters afterwards, he said some more AGP leaders were willing to join the BJP and warned of an erosion in the regional party.