By IANS
Raipur : Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) president Rajnath Singh Wednesday recommended adoption of Chhattisgarh’s ambitious food subsidy scheme of selling rice at Rs.3 per kg by all BJP ruled states as a model to provide succour to the poor.
The main opposition Congress party has, however, dismissed the unveiling of scheme as a gimmick to woo voters before election. The state is likely to go to the polls this November.
Singh was in the state capital to flag off the Rs.8.37 billion scheme targeting to benefit 3.4 million poor families in the state.
“It would be nice if the other BJP-ruled states too implement the scheme,” Singh told media persons at Raipur airport.
The BJP president also used the opportunity to attack the Congress party: “It is the Congress that has to be blamed for the country’s poverty. The party (Congress) ruled for most of the years after independence and did nothing to alleviate poverty”.
A brainchild of Chief Minister Raman Singh, the subsidised rice scheme was launched in 15 towns simultaneously. Three chief ministers of BJP ruled states – Shivraj Singh Chouhan of Madhya Pradesh, Vasundhara Raje of Rajasthan, B.C. Khanduri of Uttarakhand – were present in Chhattisgarh on this occasion.
The Congress party, however, wrote off the scheme Wednesday as an “election rice” scheme.
“Smelling an imminent defeat in upcoming assembly election, this (BJP) government has launched an election rice scheme. The BJP cannot fool the public. If it was really serious then why was it (the scheme) was not launched during the past four years of its rule,” asked Ramesh Varlyani, Congress party spokesman in the state.
The scheme is to be implemented through 10,400 outlets of the public distribution system all over the state.