Prime Minister Narendra Modi, at an election rally here on Sunday, raised several local issues such as the water crisis in Tungabhadra command area and power scarcity. He also used these issues to criticise the Congress.
Amid a cheering crowd, Mr. Modi began his address by hailing the rich Dasa and Sharana traditions of the land that advocated the coexistence of communities and blamed Congress for learning nothing from them.
“Had it [Congress] learned a lesson from the great traditions, it wouldn’t have committed the sin of dividing people along caste lines,” he said.
Pointing at the prevailing water crisis at the tail-end of Tungabhadra Left Bank Canal that irrigates around 6 lakh acres in Raichur, Mr. Modi blamed the Congress for turning a deaf ear to the farmers’ water woes.
“The region is known as a rice bowl for its large-scale cultivation of Sona Masuri paddy. Farmers suffer from a lack of water for irrigation every year. Despite having the Krishna and the Tungabhadra, the farmers struggle to get a drop of water. However, the Congress government never thought of addressing the water crisis. It had promised to remove silt from the Tungabhadra reservoir. But, it forgot this after assuming power,” he said.
Citing BJP-led Maharashtra government as a role model in removing silt from tanks and reservoirs, Mr. Modi said that the BJP government, if it assumed power in the State, would launch a campaign of dredging rural tanks and reservoirs so as to make them hold more water for irrigation so that farmers would not face scarcity.
Power crisis
Triggering the sentiment of Raichur people in terms of power generation, the PM held the State government responsible for keeping the district in “the dark.” “Raichur generates most of the energy that the State consumes. The main current switch of Karnataka is in Raichur. Yet, it lives in darkness. The sleeping government and sleeping Chief Minister never bothered about this,” he said.
Pointing at the Congress’ refusal in the Rajya Sabha for according constitutional status to the National Commission for Backward Classes, the Prime Minister termed the Congress anti-Other Backward Classes.
“Backward Classes have been fighting for their constitutionally guaranteed rights for a long time now. The Congress did nothing to address their issues. Now, when we went to accord constitutional status to OBC commission, it ensured that it wouldn’t happen by voting against it in Rajya Sabha,” he said. Referring to recent Parliament disruptions, Mr. Modi said that Congress was stunned by the developmental initiatives of his government and attempted to disrupt Parliament proceedings just to blur his government’s image.
Blaming Congress for having no agenda except ‘viciously attacking Modi’, the PM said that the reason behind Congress’ rage against him was that he had put a mechanism in place that prevented it from continuing their plunder and misappropriation of funds in the implementation of welfare schemes such as Public Distribution System.
He claimed that his government had stopped as much as ₹80,000 crore leakage annually in the implementation of various welfare schemes.
Mr. Modi criticised Congress for keeping aside M.S. Swaminathan Commission report that recommended for at least 50% more than the weighted average cost of production as Minimum Support Price.
“The Swaminathan report was gathering dust in Sonia sister’s government and we are now implementing it,” he said.
