Bhubaneswar: Senior All India Congress Committee (AICC) member and party’s national spokesperson Abhishek Manu Singhvi, who was in city Saturday, termed the Biju Janata Dal (BJD) ‘fraud’ and ‘hypocrite’ on the issue of Minimum Support Price (MSP) for paddy.
Singhvi told reporters that the BJD government had been shedding crocodile tears on the issue of MSP. He said while Prime Minister Narendra Modi did not give time to an all party delegation from Odisha to discuss the MSP issue, the BJD helped the NDA government in the Parliament during the No Confidence Motion by abstaining itself from participation in the voting which he said was an insult to the whole state.
He said, “It is utter hypocrisy and double speak of the BJD government. Could the Modi government deny MSP hike if the BJD decided to vote against the NDA government in the Parliament? But they did just the opposite. Now you decide who is fraud and hypocrite.”
He also castigated the BJD government to name the farmers’ grant scheme “Kalia” after lord Jagannath. “The CM tried to take a name of religious importance that is well regarded throughout the country. Isn’t it an insult to the name? It seems the CM also has now been infected with the same disease of jumlebaazi of the PM. In the Kalia scheme, the first word is Krushak (Odia) while all others are English. This was to take political mileage and exploit religious sentiments,” he said.
Asked about BJD’s reservation against farm loan waiver, which was recently sanctioned by the newly-elected government in Chhattisgarh, Singhvi said, “If the farm loan waiver is ridiculous, is the grant to farmers a great idea after 18 years? You are giving complete grant after 18 years of your rule and we promised it when we were not in the government. Then who is ridiculous? And when we were in government then too we had given that. It is the ruling government in state who seems ridiculous.”
PNN