10 May 2024, Chandigarh: Slamming the BJP government for its anti-farmer policy, former Union Minister and candidate for the Congress (India Alliance) from the Sirsa Lok Sabha constituency, Kumari Selja said, “The country’s food providers are becoming weaker, and it seems like the government wants to destroy the farmers. Congress has announced 5 guarantees for farmers, and these will be implemented as soon as the government is formed.”
Selja further expressed that MSP will be given legal status and the price of crops will be given according to the Swaminathan formula, GST on agricultural inputs will be removed, an Agriculture Loan Waiver Commission will be constituted to determine the amount of loan waiver, import-export policy will be made for stable prices of agricultural products, changes will be made in the PM Crop Insurance Scheme, and compensation for crop damage will be paid directly to the bank accounts of farmers within 30 days.
Promising to resolve the people’s grievances, Selja said that in the villages and towns, whatever local issues there are, will be resolved after consultations and discussions among Congress leaders once the Congress government is formed.
While touring various villages in the Sirsa assembly constituency on Friday, she appealed to the people to vote for the Congress.
Kumari Selja said that our biggest concern is the current atmosphere of ‘fear, threat, and hatred’. For the past ten years, people from every section have been living in fear. Laws and investigative agencies are being weaponized to intimidate people. Hatred has been spread among people of different religions, languages, and castes. Democracy in India is being hollowed out.
She first reached Bhagwan Parshuram Chowk and offered prayers and worshiped the idol of Lord Shri Parshuram. Addressing a public meeting in the village of Bajekan, she said that she has an old relationship with this village, when in 1988, after the death of her father, she contested a bye-election, the then Congress district chief Thakur Bahadur Singh, senior leader, Minister Chaudhary Jagdish Nehra, Minister Laxman Das Arora went to the village and introduced her to the people, since then she has a relationship with the people here.
She said that today is a fight of ideologies, BJP is doing politics in the name of religion and caste, creating divisions among people. BJP has nothing to do with development, it just chants slogans of development. She added that Congress is fighting to save democracy, to save the poor, farmers, labourers, and traders.
Kumari Selja said that unemployed youth are wandering, no one is listening to them and whoever has denied the power of youth, the country has never progressed. The youth have fallen prey to addiction to drugs, addiction is at its peak in Sirsa and the government and administration are not taking effective steps to curb addiction, although Dabwali has been made the police headquarters to control addiction, but has addiction stopped? It is still going on. Until the noose is tightened on the drug traffickers, addiction will not stop, for this, leadership, intention, and policy are needed and the Congress government will make the state addiction-free.
She said that Congress has promised to make women socially, economically, and politically strong, Congress fulfills what it says, Congress promises and announcements are not just rhetoric, today BJP is a party of rhetoric. She said that a resolution has been taken to start the Mahalaxmi scheme to provide one lakh rupees annually unconditionally to women from poor families. This amount will be sent to the bank account of the oldest member of the family if there is no elderly woman in the family. Fifty percent reservation in government jobs will be reserved for women by the central government. The amount of institutional loans given to women will also be increased. She said that Congress has announced justice, youth justice, and women’s justice guarantees.
