BJP GEAR UP THEIR CAMPAIGN AGAINST KAMAL NATH
BHOPAL: Madhya Pradesh faced a strange situation when both the ruling party and main opposition party took to streets to protest against each other. While Congress protested against the Central government for the delay in giving special grant to meet the extra expenditure for giving compensation to the people and particularly to Kisans for the huge loss due to heavy rains and floods. At the same time BJP held demonstration to protest against the Kamal Nath government for its failure to give relief to Kisans.
In a bid to counter the BJP’s Kisan Aakrosh Andolan, the Congress on Monday held state-wide demonstrations in every district against the Modi government for not releasing funds for flood relief works. The demonstration in the state capital was headed by former Union minister Suresh Pachauri, State Mahila Congress President Mandvi Chouhan and district Congress president Kailash Mishra.Congress leaders and workers gathered at the Roshanpura Square, held a protest meeting for nearly two hours. Later, the party leaders marched towards Raj Bhavan to submit a memorandum to governor Lalji Tandon. The memorandum was addressed to President Ramnath Kovind seeking his intervention for getting the fund released by the Union government for flood relief work. However, the march was stopped by police near the Raj Bhavan where party workers raised anti-BJP slogans and jostled with men-in-uniform. Congress leaders were informed that Lalji Tandon is not in town. Hence, a delegation of Congress leaders, including Suresh Pachauri, walked to the governor’s office and submitted the memorandum.
Speaking to media state congress spokesman Ravi Saxena said, “There has been incessant rains and floods causing unprecedented devastation in Madhya Pradesh. The BJP led Union government is discriminating against the state and not releasing even a single penny for flood relief work here. Chief minister Kama Nath handed over the state’s memorandum on floods to Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union home minister Amit Shah. The central survey team has visited the state twice but to no avail”.
Congress leaders claimed that while the Centre has released aid packages to Bihar and Karnataka, It has not released any fund for Madhya Pradesh which has 28 BJP Lok Sabha MPs out of a total 29.
BJP on its part launched a “Kisan Akrosh Andolan’ across MP against the alleged failure of the Congress-led Kamal Nath government to give relief to farmers affected by heavy rains and delay in loan waive scheme. BJP workers across the state also burnt ‘inflated’ power bills as a mark of protest.
BJP state president Rakesh Singh spearheaded the protest in Narsinghpur while former chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan led the agitation in Rewa. LoP Gopal Bhargava took charge in Bhopal. BJP workers also clashed with police for violating prohibitory orders under Section 144 in Jabalpur, Gwalior and Bhopal. Prohibitory order is in force in the state owing to a Union government alert in wake of impeding Ayodhya case judgment by SC.
“The Congress government has lost faith of farmers and poor. If the assembly elections are held today, Congress will face the same fate as it had suffered during Lok Sabha elections in May 2019. If Congress could get even 30 of the 230 seats in the assembly elections, I will quit politics” claimed Bhargava while talking to reporters.
Before the protest in Rewa, former chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan met the kin of a farmer Vanspati Sahu, who committed suicide recently allegedly due to debt, in Patna village. “Congress made false promises of loan waiver which were not fulfilled. Our farmers are forced to commit suicides. They are being served recovery notices by the banks. If farm debts are not withdrawn, we will not allow the Nath government to continue” said Chouhan.
It may be recalled that the Madhya Pradesh chief minister Kamal Nath has already announced to stage a day-long protest fast, along with his ministerial colleagues, at Delhi, it would add a new chapter to the history of confrontation between the Central and the state governments.
The decision to mount the protest in the national capital has been taken because of the delay in sanction of Central aid for alleviating the miseries of the people, particularly the farmers, born out of the torrential rains and floods in many parts of the state. The state government has alleged that the Centre was deliberately delaying the grant of aid.
Nath and all the other ministers will sit on a hunger strike for a day in New Delhi to protest against the Centre’s ‘discrimination” against Madhya Pradesh in granting funds for flood relief.
The state government says that the Narendra Modi Government has released funds for Bihar and Karnataka but not Madhya Pradesh. “The Centre is discriminating against Madhya Pradesh and its 7.5 crore people. More than 55 lakh farmers have been affected by the heavy rains and floods and standing crops on 60 lakh hectares of land have been destroyed,” minister for law and state government spokesperson PC Sharma said.
According to Sharma, “Chief Minister Kamal Nath visited New Delhi twice and personally handed over details of the devastation caused by the floods to Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home minister Amit Shah. The Centre has since released funds for flood relief to Karnataka and Bihar but it is delaying financial aid to the people of Madhya Pradesh.”
(IPA Service)