To divert attention of the people from the raging liquor and other scams haunting the ruling party, the embattled State Congress took out a rally here on Saturday, venting anger against the Centre for failing to control the sky-rocketing prices of edible items from pulse to vegetables.
The protest rally ended after the rallyists submitted a memorandum addressed to Prime Minister Narendra Modi through the office of the district magistrate. As planned earlier, the activists from several party affiliates, including those of women, youth and students, participated in the rally that was led by the PCC president Kishore Upadhyaya.
The rally started from the Congress Bhawan on Rajpur Road where the participants assembled and ended at the DM office near the court. In his address, Upadhyay charged the people were feeling cheated with the BJP-led NDA Government having delivered nothing on its flamboyant pre-poll promises in the first year of its tenure. “How can one forget the BJP’s Prime Ministerial candidate who is the PM now pompously promised to bring down prices in the next 100 days since assuming chargeIJ What about their promise of distributing food items at subsidised ratesIJ One year has passed since he became PM. The people owe an explanation why the prices of essential edible items are almost doubling. The ruling in the denial mode would not help them in the least,” he said.
Speaking of the prices of the petro products, he said the Centre had not cared to reduce their prices when the prices of crude oil were plummeting across the world. “Does it signify that theirs is a people friendly GovernmentIJ” he asked.
Dwelling on the pro-poor face of the former UPA regime, the State Congress leader said they had initiated food security schemes to give solace to the unprivileged people. “But the BJP-led NDA regime wound up the scheme, landing the poor onto the brink of starvation,” he said. Dubbing BJP as a party of hoarders, he said the Centre was helping them to fleece the poor by raising prices of edible items like flour, rice, pulse, edible oil, vegetable and fruits. “However, interestingly, the hike in the prices of these items is not helping the growers in the least. Frustrated, they are committing suicide,” he said.
To buttress his point, Upadhyay circulated figures of comparison vis-à-vis the prices of essential commodities under NDA and UPA regimes. “For instance, onion price is `60 per kg while it was `20 per kg; Arhar daal is `120 per kg while it was mere `80 per kg; milk `50 per litre while it was mere `40 per litre; petrol price was `76 per litre but now it is `65 per litre; diesel was sold @ `58 per litre but now `49 per litre,” he said, while distributing the leaflets that contain the contrasting figures.