NARENDRA SASTRY
MUMBAI, SEPTEMBER 4—After having whipped up patriotic fervour and exploited effectively the issues like Pulwama attack and Balakot air strike in the Lok Sabha polls, the ruling BJP is now all set to make an emotive issue like the abrogation of Article 370 of the Constitution as its major plank for the Maharashtra Assembly polls to be held in October this year.
As he virtually launched his party’s campaign for the Maharashtra Assembly polls at Solapur in western Maharashtra on Sunday, BJP national president Amit Shah spelt out his party’s clear-cut intent that it would try to corner the Opposition Congress and its alliance partner NCP on the Modi government’s recent move to annul Article 370 of Constitution which gave special status to Jammu and Kashmir.
Setting the agenda for the Assembly elections, Shah asked Congress’ former president Rahul Gandhi and NCP founder-president Sharad Pawar to clarify their stand on whether or not they supported the Centre’s decision to abrogate Article 370. “The people of Maharashtra want to know as to what is the stand of the Congress and NCP on the Centre’s decision to abrogate Article 370. Do both parties want the terrorism to continue unabated in the country? Do they want Pakistani jehadis continue to infiltrate into the country and engineer terror acts across the country”.
Mincing no words, the BJP national president linked the abrogation of Article 370 with the Maharashtra Assembly polls and said: “After the abrogation of Article 370, Maharashtra is the first state to go in for the Assembly polls. Rahul Gandhi says the removal of Article 370 was a very big blunder. Let the people of Maharashtra decide if it was a blunder. Rahul Gandhi has to fight the Maharashtra Assembly polls on Article 370. We have nothing to worry, because the people of this country are standing by Narendra Modi like a hard rock
Slamming Gandhi for going to town claiming that “violence has broken out in Kashmir after the abrogation of Article 370”, the BJP national president said that since annulment of special status for Jammu and Kashmir on August 5 an 6, “not single bullet has been fired nor has a single tear gas shell been burst” and that no one been killed in any untoward incident.”
That the BJP cannot do without Pakistan in its campaign for any election became clear that when he tore into Gandhi by saying: “Pakistan Parliament is using Rahul Gandhi’s statement to criticise India. Pakistan’s foreign minister has used his statement to make a petition in the United Nations. I would like to ask Rahulji as to which country he is speaking for. Pakistan is saying the same thing that he is saying. Should we not ask as to why Rahulji is making such statements?,”
By deciding to campaign on an emotive issue like the removal of Article 370 in the election, the ruling BJP wants to divert the attention of the people from the pressing issues like the economic recession, lack of jobs, farmers’ distress, continued farmers’ suicides and the yet-to-be fully executed farmer loan waiver scheme.
On the economic recession and job losses in various sectors being faced by the country, the ruling BJP continues to be in a denial mode. Like many other states, Maharashtra continues to reel under the tremendous strain caused by the demonetisation and lopsided implementation of Goods and Services Tax (GST).
The automotive cluster in the Maharashtra, which boasts of major domestic automakers like Tata Motors, Bajaj Motors, Force Motors, is one of the largest and promising sectors. It accounts for 50.9 percent net share in the country. It contributes to 10.4 per cent of the total employment in the state. With automobile and manufacturing industry in recessions, Maharashtra has witnessed unprecedented job losses for the past one year.
The recent rainfall notwithstanding, Maharashtra continues to reel under the agrarian crisis. The severity of the agrarian crisis should be seen in the context of the unabated farmers’ suicides and poor implementation of the farm loan waiver scheme announced by the BJP-led saffron alliance government in the state. The available official statistics, obtained by RTI activist Jeetendra Ghadge, reveal that the number of suicides went up from 6268 in 2015 to 11,995 in 2018.
Incidentally, in the first four months of 2019, as many as 808 farmers committed suicides in various parts of the state. The farmers’ suicides are continuing unabated.
Another bone of contention that is bound to go against the BJP-led saffron alliance government in Maharashtra is the pathetically poor implementation of the Rs 34,022 crore loan waiver scheme “Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Krishi Samman Yojana” which it announced on June 4, 2017.
Under the waiver scheme, the Maharashtra government was to waive the agricultural loans of 89 lakh farmers. Of them, early 40 lakh farmers were expected to become totally debt-free, a situation that would have facilitated them to take fresh loans from banks. Of the total beneficiaries under the scheme, as many as 36.10 lakh farmers were eligible for a financial assistance of Rs 1.50 lakh each to clear their piled up loans.
However, the state government has not implemented the 2017 loan waiver scheme. However, Chief minister Devendra Fadnavis recently announced that loans taken up by flood-affected farmers holding land up to one hectare would be either waived off or paid by the state government. In another announcement, Fadnavis said that if voted back to power, the BJP-led saffron alliance government would make Maharashtra a drought-free state during the next five years. Incidentally, he had made a similar statement and said that Maharashtra would be made a drought-free state by 2019, a thing that did not happen. Now, he is repeating the promise for the next five years.
After performing well in the recent Lok Sabha polls when the ruling BJP-Shiv Sena alliance won 41 out of total 48 seats, the Devendra Fadnavis government thinks it is sitting pretty on the ground that it bucked the anti-incumbency in the April-May 2019 polls. It hopes to repeat its performance in the Assembly polls and re-capture power in the state. What has helped matters is that both the saffron alliance have poached vast number of leaders from the NCP and Congress in recent months, thus weakening the two major Opposition parties.
No wonder that the BJP prefers to go with the emotive issue like Article 370 abrogation than the development agenda for the State Assembly polls. However, it remains to be seen if the ruling BP-Shiv Sena will have a cakewalk in the Assembly polls or the weakened Opposition will have the last laugh.
