With Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi pushed all his all strength to give new energy to the Party here in Uttar Pradesh by assuring the farmers that their loans will be waived off and electricity bills will be cut to half within 10-days of Congress forming government here in the State, All India Congress Committee (AICC) general secretary Gulam Nabi Azad, had exposed the `truth’ behind the “assurance” which might now led to a major setback for the Party.
``If we form government here in UP, then the small agriculture loans taken by the farmers from state recognised or local banks like Cooperative Banks, Cooperative societies etc will be waived off within 10-days but all the other agriculture loans taken from Nationalised banks or other Central organisations, the same will be only waived off if the people voted us to power in the Centre also”, clarified Azad while revealing that how the Congress will go after Rahul will get ``Maang Patra” (Demand letter) filled by the farmers during his 2500 KMs long Deoria se Dilli Kisan Yatra’.
Azad made above revelation while addressing media along with state president Raj Babbar here on Thursday evening. Interestingly Azad not stopped here and he also clarified about the `Electricity Bills”, which Rahul was assuring to cut to half. ``The electricity bill which will be cut to half is only related to the power used for agriculture purpose like running tube-wells, pumps, or another agriculture gadgets”, mentioned Azad.
However, Azad, who is also incharge of Party affair here in the State, claimed that the response which Rahul Gandhi is receiving in his Yatra pointed that people had started looking back towards Congress and that they will form next Government. He also attacked the Narendra Modi government on the Minimum Support Price (MSP), the issue which is strongly raised by Rahul in his meetings and `Khat Sabha’. ``During United Progessive Alliance (UPA) regime, the farmers get the highest MSP in the last 60-years but after formation of government under Narendra Modi, the farmers were getting the lowest MSP in the same period”, asserted Azad while saying that Modi had just fooled the farmers by assuring them at the time of election campaign that NDA government will fix MSP which will be at least 50 percent more than the cost incurred on production of any crop. When he was asked to comment on the UP government’s claim that they have waived cooperative loan of the farmers upto Rs 50,000 after the SP government came to power, the Congress leader said that this waiver was only on papers and not a single farmers got the benefit.
The Congress leader said that the NHRC report on the exodus of people from Kairana in Shamli district did not give elaborate reason for migration.”People leave the place for job or for their livelihood which cannot be called as exodus,” he stated. Azad also announced that the kisan yatra as well as other two ``27 saal-UP behal” yatra would end before Dusherra on October 11.
Meanwhile Rahul Gandhi continued to raise his demand for an Union Farmer budget saying that farmers are afraid of loosing their rights in the present Narendra Modi government. ‘’Every farmer in the country knows the real motive of the BJP government at the Center. Hence, the Centre should make a separate budget for the farmers after they have merged the railway budget with the general budget” he stated. Addressing series of road side public meetings on his 15th day of the Deoria se Delhi Kisan yatra in Kanpur, Unnao, and Rae Bareli, Gandhi while replying to the question of Union Finance minister Arun Jatiely that why Congress did not go for separate farmers budget, said ‘’the farmers had full faith in the Congress that they will protect the interest of the farmers but in this BJP government they have all apprehension about it.’’
Gandhi had on Wednesday suggested PM Modi that they should bring a separate budget for the farmers. This Kisan budget should exclusively deal with the budgetary provisions schemes and projects to benefit the farmers, Gandhi said. He also said that he will raise the issue in the lok Sabha pressing for the ‘Kisan budget’. He said along with this, the issue of waiver of loan of the farmers, increasing the Minimum Support Price(MSP) and reducing the power tariff down by 50 per cent, would also be raised in the Winter session of Parliament.
Attacking the Prime Minister, the Congress vice-president said, “when Congress launched farmers loan waiver of Rs 72,000 crore during the previous regime and the introduction of MGNREGA, it was announced in a big farmers rally in Delhi and other places. But it is unfortunate, that BJP even after giving a waiver of Rs 1.10 lakh crore to the industrialists, has not announced it in any public meeting. “Gandhi said that this shows that BJP government was ‘’trying to hide’’ the facts about how just 12 people were given Rs 1.10 lakh crore.” Why Arun Jatiely and Nitin Gadkari were not saying a word on the matter,” he questioned.