In a major embarrassment for the Bharatiya Janata Party, Union Rural Development Minister Nitin Gadkari was forced to spell out the ‘merits’ of the Land Acquisition Bill to a handful of ‘farmers’ in Dwarka sub-city here on Wednesday.
While the turnout at the ‘Vishaal Kisan Rally’, hosted by the Kisan Morcha of the Delhi BJP, was far from impressive through the entire event, all but just over a hundred party workers had left by the time Mr. Gadkari arrived at the venue around two hours late.
Incidentally, New Delhi MP Meenakshi Lekhi also left the venue around half an hour before Mr. Gdkari arrived.
“I am sorry for arriving late. I had to attend a programme on the way. Though I took Metro to reach this place, I got late,” Mr. Gadkari said after taking over the microphone after a brief spell of felicitation, which was cut short following his request.
The turnout, however, failed to deter the Union Minister from targeting the opposition parties, including the Congress and the Janata Parivar constituents, for practising ‘double standards’ over the Land Acquisition Bill.
“The Chief Ministers of the Congress-ruled states like Maharashtra, Haryana and Meghalaya had written to the then UPA government that there needs to be amendment to the Land Bill or else it was against the interest of farmers. But now the same leaders are protesting the Bill despite the pro-farmer amendments introduced by our government... the same Mr. Hooda (former Haryana Chief Minister) under whose regime land of farmers was looted is now looking after preparations for the Congress party’s rally against the Land Bill,” Mr. Gadkari said.
Asserting time and again that the amendments introduced into the Act are pro-farmers and not pro-corporate, as being alleged by the opposition parties, Mr. Gadkari targeted former Chief Ministers of Uttar Pradesh Mulayam Singh and Mayawati stating that “their governments acquired land at a cost of Rs. 10 lakh per acre in Noida and sold it to the corporates at a cost of Rs. 3-4 crore per acre.”
Underlining that land is an essential commodity to provide key infrastructure in the rural areas and industrialisation, Mr. Gadkari said that the Narendra Modi government has ensured that the affected land owners are duly compensated.
“Apart from providing job, we are providing compensation that is four times the value of land in the rural areas. The acquisition Bill of the Highways Ministry has gone up from Rs. 70,000 crore to 1,80,000 crore due to the amendments introduced by the government,” Mr. Gadkari said.
Earlier, the gathering was addressed by party MPs Manoj Tiwari, Maheish Girri, Meenakshi Lekhi and Ramesh Biidhuri.
While all party MPs were to attend the rally, HarshVardhan and Udit Raj did not turn up. After hosting the farmers’ rally in the sub-city of Dwarka, the party plans to hold two more kisan rallies in the rural belt, one each in Narela and Bawana.