By IANS
Gorakhpur (Uttar Pradesh) : The two-day state executive meet of Uttar Pradesh Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), that concluded here Sunday, has resolved to get party activists into an election mode forthwith.
Besides targeting “terrorism” and “Muslim appeasement”, the party leaders urged workers “to take up issues that are close to the hearts of the people.”
Most prominent national leaders stayed away from the meet. Even party president Rajnath Singh, who hails from Uttar Pradesh, and Arun Jaitley, the party in-charge of the state, skipped the meeting.
However, what came as a morale booster for the participants was the arrival of BJP national spokesman and former union minister Rajiv Pratap Rudy.
Echoing what BJP veteran Kalyan Singh said Saturday, Rudy too sought to inspire party men to get into the election mode.
“More important than any formal resolution passed here is for all of us to get down to real business; it is time that we start establishing contact with the people and making them understand how other parties, including the Congress-led ruling UPA (United Progressive Alliance) combine, was messing up the nation,” he said.
“Evidently, people are looking for an alternative and who could prove a better one than the NDA (National Democratic Alliance)? But this we have to impress upon people,” Rudy said.
Stressing the political significance of Uttar Pradesh, he said, “If party activists pump in all their energies, there is no reason why we cannot have a tally of at least 35 here – after all the state has a total of 80 Lok Sabha seats.”
Virtually repeating the party’s economic resolution, Rudy flayed the UPA government for its budgetary provision of Rs.600 billion to write off farmers’ loans.
“The policy may sound very benevolent, but the fact remains that it would benefit not more than 23 percent of the farmers; the indebtedness of the remaining 77 percent farmers would still continue with the local money-lenders, who would continue to oppress the helpless peasants,” he said.
State BJP chief Ramapati Ram told party men he would soon chalk out an action plan to activate the entire rank and file of the party, right down to the grassroots level.
Referring to the anti-north Indian tirade launched by Maharashtra Navnirman Sena leader Raj Thakeray, Ram blamed both successive ruling governments in Uttar Pradesh and the UPA government at the centre.
“The problem has arisen because most of the governments in Uttar Pradesh had failed to create sufficient jobs in the state, thereby compelling people to head for Mumbai and other places in search of livelihood,” he said. “And the UPA government’s silence on the undue harassment of north Indians was responsible for Thakeray’s continued insolent behaviour.”