‘Cong will put pressure on Raje govt to get farm loans waived’
BANSWARA: Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi said on Wednesday that his party will put pressure on the Raj as than government to get the farmers’ loans waived off.
“We will not let the CM sleep till then,” he said.
Addressing the Ki san Akro sh rally in Rajasthan’s Banswara district, Gandhi said last year the Congress had asked PM Narendra Modi to waive loan of Uttar Pradesh farmers. “We even submitted a petition to the government signed by two crore farmers,” he said.
Maintaining that the demand for loan waiver was not just limited to UP farmers, Rahul said Congress-ruled Karnataka and Punjab had conceded to the farmers’ demand and waived off their loans. He said in Uttar Pradesh, too, the B JP government waived off loans only after the Congress put pressure on them.
The BJP-led NDA government has faced flak for its handling of the agrarian crisis with the Congress alleging that PM Modi had “failed” to keep his poll promise to beleaguered farmers. The Congress V-P has repeatedly accused the PM of siding with the corporates and ignoring farmers.
Congress hopes that the issue of farmers’ distress will play a vital role in dethroning Rajasthan’s BJP government in the 2018 state elections.
On Wednesday, Rahul asked the party leaders to exert pressure on the Va sundh ra Raje government to waive off the farmers loan .“If required, I am ready togo to any district. We are not in the government, if we had been, then there would not have been need for this speech,” he said.
Gandhi accused Modi of not creating enough jobs in the country reminding the PM of his poll promise of providing employment to two crore youth every year. He said the government was helping “50 big industrialists of the country” at the cost of dalits and tribals.
“The government is being run for few big businessmen who earn lot but for small traders, dalits and farmers, they do not have any concern,” he said, while claiming that the government did not allow a discussion on farmer issues in Lok Sabha.
Rajasthan Congress chief Sachin Pilot alleged that the farmers were suffering in the B JP rule both at the centre and the state. “Incidents of farmers suicide are on constant rise in Rajasthan, last year the number was 60. This rally will give a message that under the leadership of Gandhi, the farmers of India will throw out BJP of power.”