In a ringing endorsement of the farm-centric policies pursued by former Chief Minister BS Yeddyurappa and signalling appreciation for his return to the Bharatiya Janata Party, Narendra Modi reiterated his belief that agriculture is the root of national prosperity and the health of our villages and farmers alone would ensure India’s development. Addressing a gigantic crowd at the BJP’s Bharatha Gellisi Rally in Davangere, Karnataka, on Tuesday afternoon, the Gujarat strongman tore into the anti-farmer policies of the ruling dispensation at the Centre which has ruined the State’s cotton farmers. It was Yeddyurappa who for the first time in India had the vision to present a separate budget for agriculture, Narendra Modi lauded, whereas the Congress had not moved beyond the tradition of a separate Railway budget.
Recalling that Davangere (now the education hub of central Karnataka) was once so famous for its textiles that it was known as the ‘Manchester of India’, he demanded to know why the factories had shut down and replied that the Congress decision to ban the export of cotton two years ago was responsible for the plight of farmers who were now crushed by debt. At the same time, sugarcane farmers are denied remunerative prices for their produce and sugar is imported, as is palm oil, though the Congress at the Centre mouths platitudes about reducing imports and promoting exports!
Congress’s actions, however, are to the contrary. In a State like Karnataka, he said, it is cheaper to manufacture coconut oil and also extract cotton seed oil. But neither of these nutritious and native oils are promoted by the Government. In Gujarat, he pointed out, a 5F formula had been adopted to promote farm produce, which could be implemented wherever appropriate. This was a policy of farm to fibre (thread), to fabric (cloth), to fashion (readymade garments), to foreign (export) – an integrated model of development rooted in the geographical production of the base raw material which he has been encouraging nationwide.
In Jharkhand, he had asserted that power should be produced where the coal mines are, rather than exporting coal and building plants elsewhere. Similarly, corn (Karnataka is a large producer of maize) should be exploited to augment the country’s sugar production and end the import of sugar, a value addition that would benefit farmers immensely. Karnataka’s Banjara (nomad) community whose staple diet is corn has intimate civilisational links with Gujarat, he reminisced, and there are many common words in their language and Gujarati.
Agriculture, he said, needs infrastructure to prosper, and former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s dream of river-linking would benefit both flood-prone and drought-prone regions, he said, amidst loud roars of appreciation from the crowd. This is entirely possible, he assured the gathering, and in Gujarat, the flowing waters in the Sabarmati are actually the waters of the Narmada. Gujarat has in all linked 20 rivers and achieved new levels of 10 per cent growth in agriculture, which formula can readily be applied across the nation. The railways are also intrinsic to the development of agriculture, he said, and promised that the BJP would strive to address the problems of the villages and farmers, and bring the economy back on track.
Turning the heat on the Congress and its top leadership, the BJP’s Prime Ministerial candidate said that one leader (Rahul Gandhi) had visited Karnataka two days ago, and even the Congress president herself was in the south recently. But both deliberately avoiding visiting Andhra Pradesh and Hyderabad, where there is so much pain and heart-burning over the decisions of the Congress and a healing touch is needed. The Congress had grievously wounded both regions, but had no soothing words of solace, even though it was Andhra Pradesh that put the party in power at the Centre.
Politics, Narendra Modi said, “…cannot be so hard hearted”; the feelings and small demands of Seemandhra, the hardship that will follow the separation of Telangana, must be addressed; at the very least the people deserve a reply. But the Congress is too arrogant to care about the sufferings of the people, “satta ka nasha itna hai, Congress ka ahankaar saatwe asmaan pahooncha hai”, he charged, and said the only antidote to this insensitivity was to vote the party out of power. The future of the nation and youth will be safe only under a Congress-mukt Bharat, Modi said.
There are four enemies of democracy, he said, namely, parivaar or vansh-vaad (dynasty), jati–vaad (casteism), sampradya–vaad (communalism), and avsar-vaad (opportunism), and the Congress is full of all four vices. Its very mentality is anti-democratic; the party is addicted to the loaves and fishes of office (aish-o-araam) and cannot reflect the aspirations of the people. To rapturous endorsement from the crowd, he said that the Prime Minister says that money does not grow on trees, but the BJP knows that wealth grows from the fields and orchards of the hard-working farmer.
Countering the oft-repeated line ‘Congress is an idea’, Narendra Modi said that this was true when Mahatma Gandhi was alive, but this is the era of the naqli (fake) Gandhis. Accusing the party of having an unmatched capacity to fool others, he said the party is made of such people who can go into a pond full of water and emerge dry! Recently, one leader came to Karnataka and said that the party has no high command! Berating these claims to loud cheers from the gathering, Narendra Modi said the world knows that the party is in the hands of just one family, and that this family has no faith in democracy and believes it is only a tool to grab power during elections, “after that, there is no scope for democracy in the Congress”.
Mocking the Congress’s professed concern for women, Narendra Modi spoke of the daily media reports about rapes and gang-rapes in Delhi, which has emerged as the rape capital of the nation. Yet no plans have been fleshed out to provide security for women. If the party has any concern for women, he said, it should at least reduce prices and bring them back to the level they were at under Atal Bihari Vajpayee. Presently, he lamented, far from fulfilling the pledge of the 2009 elections to reduce prices in 100 days, the Congress was unconcerned that children are going to sleep hungry as price rise hurts the bottom-most strata of society.
Despite this, the party indulged in accusations against the Opposition. Narendra Modi challenged the Congress to tell the people how many of its leaders were in jail in Rajasthan alone, and to elaborate the crimes for which they were booked – a clear reference to the Bhanwari Devi sex scandal and other such crimes. Alluding to Gopal Kanda in Haryana, he asked the party to explain why a former minister was languishing in jail.
Congress and corruption, he charged, are twins; each goes where the other is. When Rajiv Gandhi was the Prime Minister and the Congress held sway over almost the entire polity, he himself said that every rupee sent from the Centre becomes 15 paise by the time it reaches the village. Which is the ‘hand’ that rubs the money along the way, he asked rhetorically? The Congress has always thrown dust into people’s eyes, he said. Now it is throwing chilli (pehle dhool daalte the, ab mirchi bhi daal rahe hain logon ki aankhon mein). Look at the chaos in Parliament, Ministers are behind the chaos, and they accuse the BJP of not passing their Bills. It is time to speak the truth, he said, because now the people know the truth.
Taking another potshot at the Congress vice president, the Gujarat leader said that for the Congress, India is a honey bee (an exploitable resource), but for the BJP it is Bharat Mata. Congress thinks that poverty is a state of mind, but for the BJP the service of the poor, daridra narayan, equals service to god. The BJP’s values of nationalism contrast sharply with the Congress values of dynasty and nepotism, he said. Modi urged the people to return a lotus (MP) from each Parliamentary constituency so that their sufferings could be brought to an end.
The BJP leader was presented with a special shawl designed to showcase the party election symbol, lotus, similar to the one he wore in Himachal Pradesh recently. He expressed gratitude for the gift of iron (loha) for the Sardar Patel Statue of Unity. Other leaders present on the occasion included former chief minister BS Yeddyurappa; Shobha Karandlaje; Anantha Kumar; GM Siddeswara, MP; state unit president Prahlad Joshi; Jagdish Shettar, and others.
Niticentral.com, 18 February 2014
http://www.niticentral.com/2014/02/18/in-karnataka-modi-speaks-up-for-farmers-191330.html