News Analysis India

Tag: Devi Lal

  • INLD chief’s outreach puts Nitish Kumar in Catch 22 situation

    By Express News Service

    PATNA:  An invitation from INLD chief Om Prakash Chautala to attend the birth anniversary event of his father and the former deputy prime minister Devi Lal in Jind has put Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar in a Catch 22 situation. 

    Observers said if Nitish attends the September 25 Jind event, it could deteriorate JD(U)’s already strained relations with the BJP, with whom it shares power in Bihar, but if he skips the invite, he may lose the chance to share stage with a constellation of national leaders, cherry-picked by Chautala to form a non-BJP and non-Congress Third Front ahead of the 2024 election.

    While Nitish has not confirmed the receipt of any invite, sources said Chautala has sent one to the Bihar chief minister. Chautala, who was recently released from prison after his conviction in a scam in Haryana, has invited Mulayam Singh Yadav (SP), Mamata Banerjee (TMC), Sharad Pawar (NCP), Parkash Singh Badal (SAD), H D Deve Gowda of JD(S), Farooq Abdullah (NC) and Jayant Choudhary (RLD) to the event. However, none from the RJD or the Congress has been called. 

    The Jind event comes at a time when certain sections of the JD(U) have been making the Nitish-as-PM pitch. Analysts believe Nitish stands a good chance of being named as the prime ministerial face in the proposed Third Front due to his neutral political stand. “He shares neutral relations with Mamata and Sharad Pawar, among others. If a Third Front is formed, Nitish may emerge as its PM face due to his administrator skills and secular credentials.”

  • Those opposing unveiling of Devi Lal’s statute cannot be farmers: Dushyant Chautala

    By PTI
    SIRSA: Those opposing the unveiling of former deputy prime minister Devi Lal’s statue cannot be farmers, Haryana Deputy Chief Minister Dushyant Chautala asserted on Monday and said his great grandfather was a “messiah” for the agriculture community.

    The Jannayak Janta Party (JJP) leader’s remarks came after a group of farmers staged a protest when he was in the city for unveiling an 18-feet tall statue of Devi Lal at the Chaudhary Devi Lal University.

    “If they oppose this, it shows they are not farmers. Chaudhary Devi Lal was a messiah of farmers,” Chautala, whose party is part of the coalition government with the BJP in Haryana, told reporters after the event.

    He said that Devi Lal was an institution in himself, whose entire political life was devoted to the welfare of people, particularly the farming community.

    When Chautala was in the city, a group of farmers held a protest against his visit.

    Farmers, opposing the Centre’s three farm laws enacted last year, have been protesting at public functions of BJP-JJP leaders in the state.

    While police managed to keep the protesters away from the event site which was inside the varsity, a handful of them managed to enter.

    But they were stopped before they could reach the place where the statue, built using 300 tonnes of metal, was being unveiled.

    Chautala reiterated that the farmers’ agitation is not now in the hands of farmers.

    “But it is now in the hands of those who have got a type of employment of holding protests. ]And employment of that type, where every morning they hold black flags in their hands to protest. But they do not know what they are opposing,” he said.

    Last week, while speaking to reporters in Chandigarh, Chautala had said the ongoing farmer agitation is not any more about the demands of the peasantry, but how to oppose the government and the ruling BJP-JJP alliance in Haryana.

    Chautala had also said those associated with the stir were harbouring political ambitions.

    A month ago, Chautala had said the intent of the 40 farmer leaders — spearheading the stir against Centre’s three new farm laws — is not to resolve the issue, but to serve their own interests.

    The Samyukta Kisan Morcha, an umbrella body of various farmers’ unions, is spearheading the protest against the laws.

    In Sirsa, he reiterated that the farmers’ demands were mandis should run smoothly, and these are running very efficiently.

    Their demand was that crops should be procured on minimum support price and this is also being done, Chautala said.

    He also said the Haryana government has taken several steps and launched many schemes for the welfare of the farming community.

    Farmers have been camping at Delhi’s borders since November last year demanding that the Farmers’ Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Act, 2020, the Farmers’ (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement on Price Assurance and Farm Services Act, 2020 and the Essential Commodities (Amendment) Act, 2020 be rolled back and a new law made to guarantee minimum support price for crops.