Panaji, May 25 (IANS): Fifty years were not enough for the party to remove poverty from the country, Congress leader Praniti Shinde said here on Monday.

Asked during a press conference at the party headquarters here why Congress had been unable to alleviate poverty despite being on the treasury benches for long spells, Shinde, an AICC spokesperson, said: "Fifty years are less."

Stating that the Congress was committed to eradicate poverty from India, Shinde blamed systemic ills for not letting it happen on the ground.

"What I meant is (the) Congress government has always tried to alleviate poverty and has introduced many schemes. Of course, there are loopholes in the system we are trying to.... which our president and our vice president are trying to overcome, right.

"So we have to beat these loopholes which are in the system, we have to beat these loopholes by implementing schemes which directly reach the grassroot levels," Shinde said.

'Garibi Hatao' (poverty alleviation) has been the main poll plank of the Congress party for several decades, Shinde said but despite the best attempts of the party some of the schemes introduced by it had succeeded while others failed.

She also said that no government had been able to match the efforts of the Congress to alleviate poverty.

"The steps which we have introduced to alleviate poverty, no other government has been able to that. And 50 years, even the opposition has ruled, so it has been a give and take.

"And the amount that the Congress government has done for the poor of the country in terms of the schemes and implementation, I don't think any other government has been able to reach that level," Shinde added.