Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday attacked Congress President Rahul Gandhi, saying the country should decide if it wants a “pradhan sevak” who works tirelessly, or one who spends months on vacation abroad, PTI reported. The prime minister was speaking at the party’s national council meet at Ramlila Maidan in New Delhi. Elections to the Lok Sabha are due later this year.

Modi claimed that the government’s move to provide 10% reservations to the economically backward among upper castes will enhance the confidence of “New India”. “The arrangement has been made without encroaching on anyone’s rights,” he added.

“The Opposition wants a ‘majboor sarkar’ [helpless government], while the country wants a ‘majboot sarkar’ [strong government] which works for all-round development,” Modi said. “The chowkidaar [watchman] will not stop. Wherever the thieves are, the watchman won’t spare them.” He called the mahagathbandhan of Opposition parties “a failed experiment”.

The prime minister claimed that the Congress does not want a solution to the Ram temple matter. “It is creating hurdles through its lawyers,” he said.

Modi also wondered why Andhra Pradesh, West Bengal and Chhattisgarh have barred the Central Bureau of Investigation from conducting inquiries without permission. “Despite being harassed for 12 years by the United Progressive Alliance government when I was Gujarat chief minister, we didn’t ban the entry of CBI into the state,” he said. Modi asked what “irregularities” the CBI had committed in the three states from which it has been barred.

“It has happened for the first time in the history of the country that a government that came into power with absolute majority which hasn’t been accused of corruption,” Modi claimed, according to ANI. He alleged that the erstwhile UPA government “pushed the country into darkness”, and that India lost 10 years between 2004 and 2014 to “scams and corruption”.