Nadda posts Rahul’s old speech to take swipe at him; Cong hits back

New Delhi, December 27

BJP president J P Nadda on Sunday shared an old video of Rahul Gandhi’s speech in Lok Sabha in which he seems to be advocating the need for farmers to get rid of middlemen and sell their produce directly to industry, as he accused the Congress leader of playing politics over the ongoing farmers’ protest.

The Congress hit back at the BJP president, alleging that he was trying to mislead the farmers.

“What is this magic happening Rahul ji. You are opposing now what you had advocated earlier. You have nothing to do with the country’s or farmers’ interests. You have to play politics only. But this is your bad luck that your hypocrisy will not work. People of the country and farmers have recognised your double standards,” Nadda tweeted in Hindi along with the video clip.

ये क्या जादू हो रहा है राहुल जी?

पहले आप जिस चीज़ की वकालत कर रहे थे, अब उसका ही विरोध कर रहे है।

देश हित, किसान हित से आपका कुछ
लेना-देना नही है।आपको सिर्फ़ राजनीति करनी है।लेकिन आपका दुर्भाग्य है कि अब आपका पाखंड नही चलेगा। देश की जनता और किसान आपका दोहरा चरित्र जान चुके है। pic.twitter.com/Uu2mDfBuIT

— Jagat Prakash Nadda (@JPNadda) December 27, 2020

The Congress has backed the farmers’ protest against three agriculture-marketing laws which give cultivators an option to sell their produce directly to private players.

Agitating farmers have argued that these laws are aimed at weakening the existing government’s support for the farm sector, a charge denied by the Centre.

Congress chief spokesperson Randeep Surjewala said that before targeting Gandhi, the BJP chief should have known there is no MSP on potatoes and asked him why the government had to import potatoes when there is enough within the country.

मा. नड्डा जी,

बरगलाने से पहले ये तो जान लेते कि आलू का MSP नही होता।

और…
कृषि क्षेत्र में सुधार हम भी चाहते हैं पर तीन काले क़ानूनों से किसान के जीवन पर जो हमला किया है, सवाल उस का है।

हाँ, ये भी बताएँ कि देश के किसान को छोड़ आप 10 लाख टन आलू विदेश से क्यों आयात कर रहे हैं? https://t.co/thcFGnqAhI

— Randeep Singh Surjewala (@rssurjewala) December 27, 2020

“Dear Nadda ji, before misleading the farmers, you should have known that there is no MSP on potatoes. And…we also want reforms in the agriculture sector, but the question here is the way the life of farmers has been attacked with the three black laws,” he said in a tweet in Hindi.

“You should also tell why you are importing one million tonnes of potatoes from abroad while leaving the country’s farmers,” he said, replying to Nadda’s tweet.

In his speech, apparently made in the last Lok Sabha when he was an MP from Amethi, Gandhi is heard saying that a farmer during his trip to Uttar Pradesh asked him to explain the “magic” behind a packet of potato chips costing Rs 10 while farmers sell potato for Rs 2 per kg.

When he asked what they thought was the reason for this, the farmer said factories are located very far from them and if they could sell their produce directly there, they will get all the money without middlemen earning any cut, Gandhi is heard saying in the short video posted by Nadda.

That was the idea behind a food park, and this is in a way what farmers and labourers of Amethi and 10-12 districts of Uttar Pradesh have been fighting for, he says in the clip.

Gandhi had accused the Modi government during its first term of shelving the food park project in Amethi.

The government had denied the charge and said the park never had land. PTI