The Biju Janata Dal will maintain its neutrality in the run-up to the Lok Sabha election, aligning with neither the ruling NDA nor any Opposition alliance, party leaders reiterated on Friday, even while announcing a farmers’ protest in the capital to demand more minimum support prices for paddy.
“Impossible. the BJD will not join with the BJP to fight the election,” party spokesperson and Rajya Sabha member Pratap Keshari Deb said. “We will not join any Mahagathbandhan either. Ekla cholo re [We will walk alone.]”
“We are like one tongue between two teeth. We have to survive both sides,” added Bhartruhari Mehtab, the party’s floor leader in the Lok Sabha.
Accordingly, the party is holding a separate dharna to highlight the agrarian crisis, rather than joining in any similar protest. While a number of parties opposed to the BJP had taken part in the Kisan Mukti March in the capital in November last, the BJD was conspicuous by its absence. “We don’t link farmers’ issues to politics…Our demand for an minimum support price of ₹2,930 per quintal for paddy is unique,” said Prasanna Acharya, Rajya Sabha member and president of the party’s farmers cell. The current minimum support price is ₹1,750.
BJD leader and Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik will address the rally to be held at Delhi’s Talkatora Stadium on January 8, along with all party MPs and MLAs. A trainload of farmers will come to Delhi from Odisha, and a delegation will submit a memorandum to the President, Mr. Acharya said. “In its 2014 election manifesto, the BJP promised to increase the minimum support price and fully implement the M.S. Swaminathan Commission’s recommendations. However, it has not kept its promises. We are holding it accountable,” he said.
“The Centre does not provide adequate support for farmers, but we are doing everything from our own resources,” Mr. Mehtab said, pointing to Odisha’s new scheme to provide income support to both tenant and landowning farmers. He said the scheme would be the first to cover tenant farmers or share-croppers as well as landowners, closing one of the gaps in a similar scheme being implemented in Telangana for landowners alone. However, BJD leaders admitted that only 5.47 lakh tenant farmers had so far been registered for the scheme.