Elections 2019 | Bloomer ahead of LS polls? Congress govt in MP justifies police firing on Mandsaur farmers

Bhopal: The Congress beat anti-incumbency in 2009 Lok Sabha elections with the help of farmers' votes and rode back to power, surprising political pundits and psephologists. In 2018, the party wrested power from the BJP in Madhya Pradesh after a gap of 15 years. Again, according to political analysts, angry farmers' votes against the ruling BJP were the main reason for the Congress's victory.

Congress's decision to waive farmers' loan up to Rs 3 lakh was the game changer in 2009. With that one move the Congress managed to win over the hearts of farmers across the country. The 2018 assembly elections in MP also witnessed the Congress offering sops to farmers in the manifesto and that paid off. The party came back to power after 15 years riding on the wave of pro-farmer promises.

However, after taking over the reins of the state in November last year, the party seems to have forgotten the fact that its core voters are farmers living in the rural belt.

Otherwise, what is the reason for this strange move by the new government? Barely two months after forming the government, the Congress has justified the police firing and lathi-charge on a farmers' rally by the BJP government, led by Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, in which six farmers were killed in Mandsaur district in June 2017.

Madhya Pradesh Home Minister Bala Bachchan, in a written reply to a question by MLA Harsh Gehlot of ruling Congress, said, “Malhargarh’s sub-divisional magistrate Shravan Bhandari had ordered the police firing at Pipalyamandi in Mandsaur district on June 6, 2017 to disperse a mob. This was for self-defence and prevention of damage to public and private property during an “agitation” by farmers.”

Apart from sending shock waves across the farmers' community in the state, the minister’s reply also baffled and embarrassed his own party leaders.

Senior Congress leader and former Chief Minister Digvijaya Singh told mediapersons in Bhopal, “The home minister's reply appears to have given a clean chit to the BJP government on the police firing incident in Mandsaur. We cannot accept this”.

Madhya Pradesh chief minister Kamal Nath said, “I won’t comment on it, our home minister will address a press conference on this”.

The chief minister was speaking to the mediapersons after having a round-table meeting with 61 industrialists and honchos of business groups at Minto Hall International Convention Centre in Bhopal.

Two hours after the CM’s press conference, the home minister maintained that the government has not given a clean chit to the previous regime.

“The reply was made on the basis of investigation and a report prepared by BJP government,” the minister clarified.

However, why did the Congress government went ahead with a BJP version to answer its own party MLA's question in the House is not clarified yet. The minister's reply has angered the farmers and even some Congress leaders in the state.

After the police firing incident, Congress president Rahul Gandhi was stopped by the then regime from meeting the family members of the police firing victims.

Rahul left the state without seeing them. MP Congress campaign committee head Jyotiraditya Scindia, who too was stopped on his way to the violence-hit Mandsaur, sat on a dharna in the state capital then.

The district had become the epicentre of farmers' agitation then, with the Congress attempting to cash in on the farm unrest in the largely agrarian state during its crucial November 2018 Assembly election campaign.

Since then, the issue of farmers’ unrest became a central point for Congress during its poll campaign. Congress leaders across the state criticised the state government's action of ordering firing on farmers and the then chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan announced a slew of welfare schemes to woo back the farmers ahead of the polls.

On the first anniversary of the firing incident on June 6, 2018, and five months ahead of the crucial Assembly elections in the state, Rahul Gandhi at a public meeting in Mandsaur announced that the Congress will waive farmers’ loans within 10 days of coming to power.

In its manifesto titled “Vachan Patra” (document of promise), Congress tried to woo ryots by promising a social security pension of Rs 1,000 per month to farmers above 60 years of age with land holding below 2.5 acre.

Some other sops were a 50% subsidy on loans for agriculture equipment, halving the power bill rates for them, a bonus on the MSP of some crops and a subsidy of Rs 5 per litre on procured milk.

In the elections, the Congress won 114 seats, falling two seats short of absolute majority of 116 in a 230-member House. The grand old party took the support of two BSP MLAs, one Samajwadi Party and 4 independents to form the government.

After the Congress formed the government, Kamal Nath cleared the farm loan waiver of Rs 2 lakh each for indebted farmers.

“After joining this post (of chief minister), the first file I have signed is of farm loan waiver of Rs 2 lakh each, as I had promised to the farmers,” Nath had told mediapersons.

Interestingly, the farm distress and anger of farmers did not make any impact in Mandsaur Lok Sabha constituency in the November 2018 assembly elections.

Of the eight assembly seats in Mandsaur Lok Sabha seat spread over three districts, the BJP retained all the seven seats of Mandsaur, Garoth (in Mandsaur district), Neemuch, Manasa, Jawad (in Neemuch district) and Jaora (in Ratlam district). Surprisingly, in Mandsaur’s Malhargarh assembly seat, where the farmers were shot by cops, BJP’s Jagdish Dewda, a former home minister, won.

The Congress's justification of police firing on farmers by the BJP government is unlikely to go well with its vote bank of rural belt. The government may have to do some corrective measures to woo back the farmers if it wants to win the 29 Lok Sabha seats in the coming elections, which is very crucial for the party for its battle against Narendra Modi's BJP.