Lambasting the ruling BJP for “utterly failing at governance” during its four-year in power, the youth wing of the Maharashtra Congress on Wednesday held a State-wide ‘mock’ yoga protest targeting the party for failing to deliver on its promises.
“The Modi government at the Centre and the BJP-Sena government at the State are misleading youth. None of the pre-electoral promises touted by them have been fulfilled. Instead, fake statistics showing fantastic employment generation figures are being published,” said Satyajeet Tambe, president, Maharashtra Youth Congress, who led the agitation in Aurangabad district.
As part of the protest, Youth Congress activists, lampooning Mr. Modi’s stress on yoga, performed a number of condemnation yoga asanas (postures) like ‘berojgari asan’ (to protest against unemployment), ‘Rafale asan (to decry the Rafale jet deal) and ‘mehengai asan’ (to condemn the rising fuel prices) among others in a two-hour mock agitation staged simultaneously across the State, including Navi Mumbai and Thane.
In the wake of the upcoming general and Assembly elections, the protest also doubled up as a voter outreach programme to connect with youth across the State.
“The two crore jobs promised by PM Modi and the BJP are nowhere to be seen even after four years of the party’s rule,” Mr. Tambe said, remarking that merely signing a raft of memorandum of understanding (MoU) agreements signified nothing.
He said that the BJP government’s much-vaunted programmes like Make in India and Magnetic Maharashtra had come to a cropper.
“There is no sign of any fresh investment or employment generation through such ambitious ventures. Furthermore, the government seems completely apathetic about taking any action on granting reservation to the Maratha, Dhangar and Muslim communities,” Mr. Tambe said.
To protest against the Modi government’s alleged crackdown on dissent, the activists performed a ‘troll asan’, and a ‘bhakt asan’ to satirise the acolytes of the Prime Minister. They also performed a ‘maun asan’ to rebut the BJP and Mr. Modi’s bitter criticism of former PM Manmohan Singh for allegedly remaining “silent” all the while.
“Mr. Singh’s actions spoke louder than his words. But Mr. Modi conveniently remains silent on issues that matter and instead delivers speeches making tall claims which have turned out to be hollow,” said Brijkishore Dutt, general secretary, State Youth Congress.