Ahead of the Assembly elections that are due in early 2017, the Punjab Congress on Wednesday launched its door-to-door drive campaign from Gurdaspur in an attempt to reach out to farmers and garner their support.
Punjab Congress president Capt. Amarinder Singh kicked-off party’s door-to-door farmer outreach campaign from Kotli Surat Malhi village in Gurdaspur by visiting houses of farmers with a focus on ‘farm debt waiver’ and got the form-seeking debt waiver signed by them.
In the first phase of the campaign, starting from October 12 to October 25, the party workers will engage with more than 25 lakh households.
The party plans to establish direct contact with 75 lakh voters, reaching out to more than 2 crore people in this period.
Blaming the ruling Akali-BJP government responsible for the farmers' plight in the State, Capt. Amarinder, said there were tens of thousands of farmers in Punjab who were under debt and therefore debt waiver was necessary. “I appeal farmers not to commit suicide and have faith in me.. the Congress will waive farmers debts once it forms the government,” he said
“I want to assure the commission agents [aarthiyas] that the money owed to them by farmers will be paid by the government. Also, the loans of the banks will also be paid by the government once his party is in power,” he added.
Capt Amarinder said the party leaders would reach out to the farmers and make them fill the form.
“A duplicate copy of the form will remain with the farmer who can produce it for debt relief once the Congress forms the government,” said Capt. Amarinder.
