Chandigarh, February 24
Congress MLAs today marched to the Assembly in protest against the BJP government. All the MLAs gheraoed the Assembly under the leadership of Leader of the Opposition and former Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda. Congress State President Rao Narendra Singh was also present at the protest, which began from High Court Chowk to the Assembly.
During the protest, Congress MLAs held placards with various issues in one hand and rattles in the other, raising slogans. Through this symbolic protest, the Congress party sent a clear message that the people of Haryana are grappling with numerous serious problems, while the BJP government is busy making false promises and empty promises.
The issues primarily raised during the demonstration included alleged corruption in MNREGA and the problems of laborers, paddy procurement scam, poor condition of sports stadiums and neglect of athletes, irregularities in the HPSC, misuse of the education system, flaws in the Lado Laxmi Yojana, irregularities in BPL ration cards, neglect of farmers and their problems, scams exposed in the CAG report, unemployment and job crisis, allegations of providing jobs to outsiders, drug problem and the rise in organized crime, plight of Haryana’s youth stranded abroad, failure of the Ayushman and Chirayu schemes and the blatant loot system of toll collection in the state.
Congress MLAs demanded immediate action from the government on all these issues and warned that if the public’s problems are not addressed, the agitation will intensify. Hooda said that as a responsible opposition, Congress will raise public issues on every platform, from the streets to the House. The more the BJP shirks its responsibility, the more vigorously Congress will advocate for the public.
Speaking to mediapersons, Hooda said that the BJP government has failed on every front. “From law and order to the economy, employment to inflation, agriculture to education, health to sanitation, the BJP has demonstrated its failure and incompetence in all areas”, he said.
Hooda further said that the BJP government is not able to provide MSP and compensation to farmers, while adding. “The government has miserably failed to provide employment to youth, quality education to students and security to the public. The way crimes and scams are taking place in the state, it seems as if there is no such thing as a government here. The state has been left to scamsters and gangsters.”
Regarding the pension cuts to the elderly, the Leader of the Opposition said that now the government is claiming to restore 70,000 pensions. “Whereas the government previously claimed it hadn’t cut anyone’s pension. If not, why are they being restored? Along with pensions, ration cards issued before the elections are now being cancelled, which is vote theft in itself. Nearly 1.4 million ration cards have been cancelled in Haryana since the elections. In Ambala alone, 54,000 ration cards have been cancelled”, he observed.
Hooda said that the Congress government increased the old-age pension from ₹200 to ₹1,500, a seven-and-a-half-fold increase. “Whereas the BJP government has only increased it twice in 11 years, while inflation has risen three to four times”, he pointed out.
Hooda further said that farmers are constantly being discriminated against under this government. “The weight of a fertilizer bag has been reduced from 50 to 40 kg, while the rates remain the same. The claim of providing MSP for 24 crops is also false; Haryana doesn’t grow that many crops. More than ₹2,000 crore in profits were generated from the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana, but claims are not received, and people are abandoning insurance. Not even 10 per cent of the compensation has been paid yet”, Hooda said.
