Ahead of party vice-president Rahul Gandhi’s visit to Bundelkhand region, Congress MlA from Banda, Vivek Kumar Singh wrote to him urging that the Parliament be disrupted over the Bundelkhand issue where farmers were forced to commit suicide or eat ‘grass chapatis’ due to drought for the last three years.
In his letter, Singh quetioned why can MPs’ not raise serious issues like the miseries of Bundelkhand farmers and force the Union government and the State government to take concrete steps.
The letter, which was released to the media in lucknow on Wednesday afternoon, suggested that Rahul Gandhi convene a meeting of peoples’ respresentatives from Bundelkhand to get first hand information on how the state government siphoned off the Bundelkhand package sanctioned by previous UPA government and nothing was done for welfare of the region. Gandhi is slated to visit Mahoba with senior UP Congress leaders on coming Saturday.
The MlA also suggested a nine-point remedy for the farmers of Bundelkhand emphasizing on supply of drinking water facilities and providion of free seeds and fertilisers to thefarmers for the next two years. “Every village should get new tubewells as the old ones have dried up leading to acute shortage of drinking water. Besides there should be a total ban on mining in the region and a CBI probe should be ordered on the mafias carrying out illegal mining,” the Congress leader said.
Referring to the recent visit of UP Chief Secretary Alok Ranjan to Bundelkhand for overseeing the situation, Singh said that the officer was accorded a welcome like a groom and he did nothing during his two-day stay.