Continuing his strategy of out-manoeuvring the Congress by raising issues on which it has no riposte and directly appealing to Congress’s traditional voters while retaining the core supporters of the BJP, Narendra Modi today called for a new ethic in India’s federal culture to ensure that the Prime Minister works in harmony with the Chief Ministers irrespective of the party in power at the Centre or in the States.
Indirectly alluding to the unhappiness of the Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister in the matter of relief for farmers whose crops were wiped out due to unseasonal rains and hailstorms, BJP’s Prime Ministerial candidate said that the Government at the Centre had no right to act as a “big brother” and should cooperate with the State Governments, setting aside ordinary political rivalry, “ye sanskriti is desh mein laani padegi”. Justice, he insisted, can only be done by working with everyone for the welfare of all, “sabka saath, sabka vikas”.
It may be pointed out that the Congress-NCP coalition recently received a package of Rs 1200 crore from the Centre as relief for the rains that devastated crops in large parts of Maharashtra, but Madhya Pradesh which suffered similar ruination at the same time received only Rs 400 crore. In back-to-back meetings at Mandla and Balaghat as part of his Bharat Vijay marathon, Narendra Modi drew loud appreciation from his audience when he recalled that Madhya Pradesh is the land of Rani Durgavati (a tribal queen who defeated Akbar’s army), a symbol of the fight against injustice.
Continuing the BJP stratagem of wooing tribals all over the country, and conscious of the tradition that the Prince of Ayodhya spent the major part of his exile in the forests of what is now Madhya Pradesh, Narendra Modi delighted his audience by saying that Adivasi community was here in the time of Sri Rama and in the time of Tulsi(das). They showed their valour in 1857 as well, but have never figured in the perception of the Congress. It was only Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee who took concrete measures for their upliftment, and the BJP State Governments of Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Gujarat, where 40 per cent of India’s Adivasi population lives, have served them loyally.
Proclaiming that the nation could not progress if any section of society was left behind, he mocked at the ‘shehzade’ who recently came to the State and interacted with women voters, but did not say one word on the crushing price rise despite being elected in 2009 on the promise to bring down prices within hundred days.
At Balaghat, Narendra Modi ridiculed Congress leaders from the State who are lording it over in Delhi for their inability or disinterest in providing a radio station to Seoni district. The situation is no better in Gujarat, he said, with the result that BSF jawans posted at the Kutch border have access only to Pakistan television and radio channels. The Gujarat Chief Minister said that he was tired of urging the Central Government to extend the reach of national television and radio to remote areas, especially to jawans at the borders, but this was just not the priority of the “people who are drowned in 2G and other scandals”.
It was an insult to India, he declaimed, that after the incident in which an Indian jawan was beheaded, the Pakistan Prime Minister should want to visit India. But the Government of India (read Foreign Minister Salman Khurshid) served him chicken biryani. “Are Governments supposed to behave like this” he asked, as the crowd roared in agreement. Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri’s mantra of ‘jai jawan jai kisan’ has been reduced to ‘mar jawan mar kisan’ by the UPA, he lamented, as soldiers are killed in cross-border incidents and farmers commit suicide to the neglect of a malevolent State.
He pointed out that despite a hostile Government at the Centre, which specialized in putting brakes on progress, Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan had lifted Madhya Pradesh out of the category of BIMARU States by concentrating on providing irrigation facilities to farmers; building roads; and improving power supply. But the Centre never highlighted these landmark achievements at the international level. Inviting people to envisage the heights the State could ascend if he (Modi) became the Prime Minister, he said that in sharp contrast to Chouhan’s real achievements, the current Government of India has “tantrics” from Madhya Pradesh who have built hospitals with doctors and patients on paper only! Even the foundation stone laying ceremony (shilanyas) of these hospitals has been performed, he said, and joked that it is little wonder that such a regime progressed from throwing dust in people’s eyes to squirting chili spray!
Pointing out that in the ten years since Atal Bihari Vajpayee demitted office in 2004, the nation has suffered frightening corruption which has seared every sphere from water to land to air, Narendra Modi urged the people to give the BJP all 29 seats from the State. He hinted at the need for a comfortable mandate to overcome the deficiencies of the past decades, particularly to make up for the ravine (khaai) in which the Congress has pushed the nation in the past ten years.
Niticentral.com, 28 March 2014
http://www.niticentral.com/2014/03/28/give-bjp-all-29-seats-modi-exhorts-madhya-pradesh-204932.html