New Delhi,
Powered by a spirited fight in Gujarat, the Congress is all set to make “debunking Gujarat development model” the central part of its electoral strategy.

Congress president Rahul Gandhi gave a hint of this today when he, in the first post-Gujarat verdict statement, said: “Gujarat gas jolted Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The people of the state do not believe in Modi’s Gujarat development model. They know it’s hollow. When we went to Gujarat three months ago we were told we could not match the BJP. But the people of Gujarat have shown that we can defeat Modi’s anger with love.”

By the evening news arrived that Gandhi is visiting Gujarat tomorrow for ground-level assessment of results and for personally thanking the people for helping the Congress put up its best-ever show since 1990.

The message to the Congress organistion in Gujarat is clear—start preparing for the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. A Congress leader associated with Gujarat affairs said, “We are going to start preparing for 2019 today. The next LS election will be a real fight.”

Rahul said Gujarat, by tempering BJP’s win, had shown that the Gandhian tenets of love and compassion were still deep rooted in the state’s psyche. “The people of Gujarat have shown Modi that anger will not help. Somewhere this spirit of love propagated by Mahatma Gandhi is still alive in the heart of the state,” he said raising questions about PM’s personal credibility and rejecting his assertions that Gujarat had voted for development.