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Rajnath vows 1% farm loan if BJP returns to power
Faced with the task of reviving its fortune in Uttar Pradesh, the BJP has taken leaves out of its popular State Governments to promise a complete turnaround of country's largest province where it has been out of power for almost a decade now.
Reaching its fag-end, BJP's Jan Swabhiman Yatra in UP has seen its senior leader Rajnath Singh promising a Bihar-like Public Services Guarantee Act and Madhya Pradesh-like financial aid for newly-born girl child, which she gets at the age of 18.
The Public Services Guarantee Act prescribes a time frame to act on applications related to public services.
“Within six months of coming to power, our party's Government will provide farm loan at the rate of one per cent,” Singh, a former UP CM, said at a rally at Gangauli in Ghazipur district on Tuesday.
The subsidised farm loan scheme was first conceived by the BJP Government in Karnataka and then replicated by the party Governments in Chhattisgarh and MP also.
A former Union Minister for Agriculture, Singh promised bank accounts for every farmer to ensure direct cash transfer into the beneficiary's account. The Nitish Kumar Government in Bihar is aggressively pursuing this idea.
Eyeing the agrarian community, Rajnath promised a bonus of `100 over and above the MSP for wheat and paddy. “Remember, Goddess Lakshmi does not come riding an elephant (BSP's election symbol) or a cycle (Samajwadi Party's symbol). Neither does she come waiving her hand (Congress symbol). The goddess of property always comes with a lotus (BJP symbol),” Singh said at Ranvirpur in Mau district.
Making a scathing attack on his known baiter and UP Chief Minister Mayawati, the former chief of the BJP lashed out at the BSP supremo for wasting over `20,000 crore on parks and memorial and not utilising the money to waive off farm loans.
“Perhaps after she realised that her Government was on way out, she paid floral tributes to her own statue,” Singh quipped.
Critical of Manmohan Singh regime for its failure to tame prices, Rajnath asked the Prime Minister and Congress chief Sonia Gandhi to seek the 'magic wand' from former PM Atal Bihari Vajpayee whose Government kept the prices under control.
