Much before the final run-up to the 2013 Assembly polls in Madhya Pradesh, the state Congress unit has gone into war mode against the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party with a battery of charges against the Shivraj Singh Chouhan government.
The picture that has emerged after the no-holds barred outburst by prominent Congress leaders at the start of Opposition leader Ajay Singh’s Jan Chetna Yatra, which began from Orchha on Friday, is that tough days lie ahead for the BJP spin masters, who will have more to shield in the coming days.
Before embarking on his yatra, Mr Singh had told this newspaper that his journey should not be treated as an election campaign. The purpose is to inform the people about BJP’s misrule, he said and drew attention towards problems like corruption, mining and land mafia, deteriorating law and order situation, atrocities on women, and siphoning of money received from the Centre for various flagship programmes.
He said chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan has failed on all fronts and the farmers are currently suffering due to poor management of the wheat procurement drive. The idea is to take these issues to the people’s court, he added.
At the Congress rally held at Prithvipur near Orchha in Tikamgarh district to mark the start of the Jan Chetna Yatra, prominent leaders, including party general secretary in-charge of Madhya Pradesh affairs B.K. Hariprasad and state Congress chief Kantilal Bhuria slammed the state government on the wheat procurement fiasco. Mr Bhuria even went to the extent of dubbing the government as “murderer” because of the death of a farmer in police firing during a farmer’s protest at Bareily in Raisen district earlier this week and said there is “jungle raj and we have to uproot the Shivraj Singh Chouhan government.” Mr Ajay Singh cited the case of the state health department officers, whose houses were raided by the state lokayukta on Thursday.