State president of the Bharatiya Janta Party (BJP), laxmikant Bajpai raked up a controversy by saying that the state legislature would have taken up the farmers problem of crop loss first before hiking their own wages and allowances. “I have no objection on the consensus within the political parties and even approval by the Governor over the hike of wages of the legislators. But, it would have been better if such issue was avoided and the farmers issue to help them financially would have been taken first,’ he told media persons here on Saturday.
Bajpai, who is also a MlA from Meerut but was not present in the Assembly when the Bill for the legislators wage hike was approved, said the House could have just increased the pension of former MlAs only. The State BJP president, however, said that he has no opposition to the hike in MlAs wages, as the entire BJP legislature party had supported the Bill in the Assembly. It may be mentioned here that Governor, Ram Naik, also registered his displeasure over the above issue.