BJP offers farm loan waiver in Maha, says allies to pick next CM after poll
Home Minister Amit Shah on Sunday unveiled BJP’s manifesto for the November 20 Maharashtra elections, promising loan waiver for farmers and a stringent law against forced conversions. He said all three ruling Mahayuti coalition partners would jointly take a call on the next CM after the results.
Shah said, “Eknath Shinde is our Chief Minister today. After the elections, all three Mahayuti allies will sit together to elect the CM. We will not give Sharad Pawar any chance to do that.”
The Home Minister said though the ruling allies – the BJP, Shiv Sena and the NCP — had released their own manifestos, a group of ministers of the coalition partners would be formed after the elections to fulfil every promise. The BJP’s Sankalp Patra released in Mumbai on Sunday made ambitious promises, including a stringent law to prevent forced conversions; Rs 2,100 monthly cash assistance for women; loan waiver for farmers and expansion of PM Kisan Samman Nidhi from Rs 12,000 to Rs 15,000; hike in old-age pension from Rs 1,500 to Rs 2,100; and transformation of Maharashtra into a $1-trillion economy by 2028. As an answer to Congress-led Maha Vikas Aghadi’s caste census push, the BJP pledged a skill census in its manifesto. It will determine skill gaps in industries and fill these.
Attacking the opposition Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) of the Congress, Shiv Sena (UBT) and the NCP (SP) for taking Maharashtra down when in power, Shah said the Shiv Sena and the NCP had disintegrated because their respective chiefs — Uddhav Thackeray and Sharad Pawar — had chosen families over grassroots leaders.
“Had Thackeray chosen Eknath Shinde over his son, why would the Shiv Sena split? Had Pawar chosen Ajit Pawar over his daughter, why would the NCP split? Someday both will have to draft a plan to promote genuine leaders instead of families. Otherwise their parties will disintegrate further,” claimed Shah, attacking the MVA as “an alliance of contradictions and dynasts”. He asked Uddhav to introspect over which side of the political fence he was occupying.
“You are sitting with people who opposed the revocation of Article 370, construction of Ram Mandir, UCC, CAA and Waqf reforms,” Shah said, adding while the BJP kept every promise it made, the chief constituent of the MVA, the Congress, has been urging his state units to only make promises they could keep.
“No one ever believed Article 370 could be abrogated, or Ram Mandir could be built in Ayodhya or that the UCC and the CAA could be brought and triple talaq criminalised. But we achieved all this. We made India the fifth largest economy and would make it the third largest by 2027. People believe in our promises,” Shah declared.
He singled out the Congress for “accepting All-India Ulema Board’s wishlist of 10% Muslim reservation in jobs and education in lieu of electoral support”.
“Even before the Congress has come to power, its Maharashtra chief has accepted the demand for Muslim reservation. I want to ask the people of Maharashtra if they agree with the Congress plan of cutting into existing SC, ST, OBC quotas to extend these benefits to the Muslims? The Constitution has no provision for religion-based reservation,” Shah said.
In important remarks, the Home Minister announced that the BJP-led NDA at the Centre would pass the Waqf Amendment Bill 2024 in the upcoming session of Parliament. “The MVA allies are opposing the Waqf reforms even though the current Waqf law allows vast tracts of lands, including farm and temple lands, to be taken away by the Waqf board as we are seeing in Karnataka. The opposition to the Waqf reforms means the Waqf boards can unilaterally usurp properties of the people of Maharashtra,” Shah cautioned voters. He said PM Modi with his “ek hain toh safe hain” slogan had been rightly cautioning Maharashtra against the Congress’ “casteist and divisive politics”.
