By IANS,
Bhopal/New Delhi : Senior Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader and MP Prabhat Jha Monday wrote to President Pratibha Patil to allow him “death by wish” to protest rising prices and what he called the government’s apathy over it.
“When in democracy all means get exhausted, then a path still remains which is related to one’s own life,” wrote the Rajya Sabha member in the letter, copies of which were sent to the Chief Justice of India, BJP president Nitin Gadkari and party leaders Arun Jaitley and Sushma Swaraj.
Expressing anguish at the way “the life of a common man is played with by the current dispensation”, Jha said: “The government is a giver of life, not death. But the Congress-led UPA government is giving death along with price rise.”
The BJP leader referred to the president as a “mother”, who would “never grant such wish”.
“But for the sake of 115 crore people, for whom you are also a mother, I am putting forth my request for ‘death by wish’,” he wrote.
Jha, who is Madhya Pradesh BJP chief, said this was the only way left for him to protest the price rise. “I have nothing with me except my own life.”
He alleged that while wrong policies and corruption go unchecked under the UPA government, “the game of playing with the life of the poor by raising prices every now and then continues unabated”.
In his letter, the 54-year-old politician wrote that rampant corruption and inflation have brought the common man of this country to the verge of death, “so it is better that a representative die earlier than to see its people die”.
“I find my life meaningless. I believe that it is better to give up life as a people’s representative in the public rather than witness the death of millions of people,” he wrote.
The opposition Congress called Jha’s “death-by-wish” letter a “political stunt”.
“I think Prabhat Jha has some differences with party leaders in Madhya Pradesh so he has taken such a decision. Else, if it would have been because of inflation, then he should first talk to his own government (in the state) to reduce taxes like Mamata Banerjee has done (in West Bengal) and the Congress government is doing in its states,” said Madhya Pradesh Congress chief Kantilal Bhuria.