Meanwhile, CM plans to visit house of farmer who killed himself
Mumbai : Politics over farmers’ suicides and the drought situation in the state is heating up yet again.
While the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) wants Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis to be indicted in the case of farmers’ suicides, it also accused minister for rural development Pankaja Munde and MoS water conservation Babanrao Lonikar for their announcement of a visit to the drought-hit Marathwada region ahead of NCP chief Sharad Pawar.
[alert type=”e.g. warning, danger, success, info” title=””]The Congress has said that when Fadnavis was the opposition leader, he used to demand that Congress-NCP ministers be booked under Section 302 of the IPC for farmers’ suicides, and so the same should now apply to him as CM[/alert]
Hitting out at the chief minister for the growing number of farmers’ suicides in the state, party spokesperson Nawab Malik on Monday demanded that the CM be indicted in the case.
“When Fadnavis was the opposition leader, he used to demand that Congress-NCP ministers be booked under Section 302 (punishment for murder) of the Indian Penal Code for farmers’ suicides. The same section of the law should now be made applicable to Fadnavis, since he is the Maharashtra Chief Minister,” he said.
Malik also said that Fadnavis should stop his “stunts” of going on foreign tours and concentrate on improving the lives of farmers of the state.
Meanwhile, Fadnavis said he plans to visit the house of a farmer who committed suicide on Sunday.
Fadnavis told reporters that he plans to visit the kin of Mangesh Umale, a 27-year-old Akola-based farmer, who committed suicide on Sunday.
Umale had mentioned in his suicide note that he was an admirer of Fadnavis and he wished that the chief minister would visit his house in Akola.
Meanwhile, NCP legislator Jitendra Awhad criticised the rural development minister and called her move “an immature political strategy”.
Munde and Lonikar announced on Monday that they would begin a tour of Marathwada on August 12. NCP Chief Sharad Pawar had earlier announced his plan to tour the region starting August 15.
Munde, however, said that her three-day visit to the region in order to visit people affected by drought is part of her duty and it should not be politicised. “The programme had been finalised on August 7 at a review meeting with officials,” she said.
