BJP UP-incharge dubs farmers’ stir motivated, irrelevant

LUCKNOW: A day after BJP’s national general secretary (organisation) BL Santhosh held a meeting and tasked the cadres to roll out a rural connect initiative to popularise four years of the Yogi government, party’s UP in-charge Radha Mohan Singh on Saturday dubbed the farmers’ agitation “motivated and irrelevant.”

Singh’s statement reflected the line the BJP is likely to take during the gram sampark or village-connect campaign, announced during the presence of national general secretary (organisation) BL Santosh in Lucknow on Friday.

The initiative is timed to expand the party’s rural outreach initiative amid the ongoing farmers’ agitation which the BJP leaders claim is mostly political. The outreach initiative, party leaders say, has a two-fold purpose: Popularising initiatives of the Yogi government and to “expose” those behind the farmers’ stir. The stir, BJP leaders claim, is aimed at discrediting the government.

BJP leaders and cadres would do so during chaupals (small rural gatherings). The cadres have been told to galvanise the booth-level cadre.

“As many as 11 rounds of talks have been held with farmers’ delegation and during these talks no farmer leader could tell what was it about farm laws that they felt was anti-farmer or against agriculture? The unsavoury turn of events on the Republic Day has also exposed the agitation,” said Singh, who is also the national vice president of BJP. He was also the agriculture minister during Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s first stint.

“In Congress-ruled Punjab, there is a provision of minimum penalty of Rs 5000 that could be raised up to Rs 5 lakh if the clauses of the Contract Farming Act are violated. But the three farm laws of the Centre have no such penal provision. In the last Lok Sabha polls, the Congress manifesto contained promises for farm reforms that was akin to the laws passed by the BJP government. Yet, today, they are opposing the same laws for the sake of opposition. Farmer leaders associated with the agitation are acting more like opposition leaders,” Singh said.