At Bhim Nagar’s Ram Leela ground, Gadkari, along with Gurgaon MP Rao Inderjit Singh, extended support to Sharma.

Addressing a crowd of 2,000-2,500 people, Gadkari said the election will not decide the fate of BJP or Congress, but the future of Gurgaon. “It’s been 75 years since Independence. The Congress was in power for 65 years at the Center and state. In my department, in the last 10 years in Haryana, we’ve done three times more work than what Congress did in 65 years,” he said.

Sharma, meanwhile, said he had appealed to Gadkari for an elevated road to deal with frequent traffic snarls in the city: “In 2009, when the Delhi-Jaipur highway was being made, the Congress awarded the tender to a contractor who abandoned the project. … I will complete work on the highway by December and relieve you from this hardship.”

Gadkari said in Delhi-NCR, his ministry’s projects are worth Rs 65,000 crore: “We have Rs 2 lakh crore worth of projects in Haryana that we have completed, begun, and are in the pipeline by the end of 2024.”

He listed out projects including Dwarka Expressway, Gur-gaon-Rewari Highway, and Mumbai Expressway and said tenders for 9 foot-overbridges will be floated in October for Rewari and Gurgaon and work on four flyovers in the region will start in two months. : “I ask my journalist friends to record everything and to make ‘breaking news’ if I go back on my announced projects. No one will be able to publish news against me because if I take something up, I won’t go back on it.”

“Haryana’s national highways infrastructure will be better than the US by the end of 2024… Work in this 10 years was just a trailer, asli film shuru hona baaki hai,” he said.

On caste, Gadkari said everyone wants to compete with each other on being the most backward and it is becoming political.

Stating that he won for the third time in his constituency, Nagpur, he added: “There are around 40,000-45,000 SCs and Muslims. In front of these 50,000 people, I said I wouldn’t compromise on my principles. Jo karega Jat ki baat, usko kaske marunga lathh (Anyone who talks about Jat, I will beat him with a stick).”

There needs to be “social and economic equality”, he said. “Our issues are not due to caste, religion, language.”

MP Inderjit said he had asked for support from Gurgaon and it gave him over 1 lakh votes and sent him to the Lok Sabha. “I presented your demand to Gadkari. We need an elevated road and he gave his assurance that it will be made. You have the assurance that an elevated road will come up in Gurgaon as well,” he said.

On local issues of garbage, electricity, and roads, he said: “… Whose money runs Haryana? I’m telling you 100% of the income is from Gurgaon. In the coming days, we will give power to the pen wielded by the mayor, councilor, and MLA over bureaucrats to control them and even write an ACR against them if need be. We have the biggest budget and our roads have potholes, our sewage lines are not clean, and our homes don’t have electricity. We will make sure the 73rd and 74th Amendments are in effect like in Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh. I’m raising my voice for you and I need a companion to raise your demands. That is Mukesh Pehelwan (Sharma).”

Addressing Dalits in the crowd, the MP said, “The opposition said reservation will be revoked and the Constitution will be amended. When the party was elected, the PM first went to the Constitution. The SC community among us should rethink this, we are not seeking votes in the name of Brahmins or Ahirs, we are leaders of chhattis biradaris (36 clans),” he said.