Nagpur: The Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) youth wing leader
Salil Deshmukh has blamed BJP MLA Ashish Deshmukh for leaving cotton growers of Katol and Narkhed out of the list of ‘pink bollworm’ victims.
“These two tehsils have been excluded from the compensation package announced by the state government while over a lakh farmers have suffered crop damage from the infestation,” Salil said.
Ashish and Salil are cousins but turned political rivals after Ashish defeated his uncle Anil Deshmukh from Katol seat in 2014 elections. “The MLA tried to hog publicity by staging agitation for a week in Katol though he is a ruling party MLA and has access to the chief minister and the government. After all that drama, Ashish went to Mumbai but all through the Budget Session did not open his mouth to raise the farmers’ plight in his constituency. As a result, farmers of Katol and Narkhed tehsils were deprived of the relief package,” said Salil.
Slamming Ashish for the failure, he said it was the MLA’s responsibility to see that farm surveys for crop damage assessment were done properly. “He could have taken up the matter with local officials and then with the government. But instead, he was busy doing ‘drama’ of sit-in fast while adverse reports of surveys were sent to the government,” Salil alleged.
With a view to highlight the issue, Salil and his father Anil have travelled through every village in the two tehsils and collected signatures of over 50,000 farmers on a petition seeking ‘pink bollworm compensation package’.
