Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav accused the Yogi Adityanath government of protecting the interests of big business houses under the cover of the COVID-19 crisis while ignoring the interests of the poor and the farmers.
“The farmers suffered huge losses due to the unseasonal rains earlier this year and before they could recover from the losses, their crops have been destroyed by floods and locust attack. So far no relief has been provided to farmers who have also suffered due to lockdown,” the SP chief said in a statement issued here on Wednesday.
“Ever since the Bharatiya Janata Party came to power in UP in March 2017, it is taking the farmers for granted, making tall promises while delivering nothing. There was no procurement of the Rabi crop from farmers as per the Minimum Support Price (MSP) scheme announced by the Centre. Purchasing centres were not opened in many districts and where they opened, the farmers were harassed on one pretext or the other,” the SP chief alleged.
Akhilesh Yadav said the Samajwadi Party had raised the demand of Rs 10 lakh compensation to farmers but the BJP government ignored it. He said hundreds of farmers had committed suicide in the Bundelkhand and Brij areas while lightning had also claimed the lives of many people.
He said the BJP had announced in its manifesto (Sankalp Patra) that the farmers would get one-and-half times the cost of production of crop but they were not even getting the cost of production.
The former chief minister of UP said that the claim of doubling the farmers’ income was a lie from the very first day. “Leave the year 2022, during the BJP government, farmers will feel hopeless even till 2024,” he said.
Yadav said that the officers of chief minister’s Team 11 had no connect with the ground level so they were ignorant of the grievances of the farmers , villagers and rural households.
“The grievances of farmers do not draw their attention. They do not have any sensitivity towards the farmers. Farmers are only a vote bank for the BJP,” the SP chief said.