Fund Modi rally or land in jail, BJP MP tells mill owner

 The Bharatiya Janata Party, which has been harping on fighting corruption, has landed itself in an embarrassing situation. A senior MP is alleged to have asked a sugar mill owner in Bihar to cough up a substantial sum for Narendra Modi’s forthcoming rally in Patna.

The woman parliamentarian, Rama Devi, allegedly threatened the industrialist and told him that if he failed to dole out at least Rs 5 lakh for the BJP’s ‘Hoonkar rally’ in Patna, slated for October 27, she would get him arrested on the charge of not paying dues to cane farmers. Rama Devi, who was earlier with the RJD, is at present BJP MP from Sheohar. On October 8, she reportedly made a phone call to Om Prakash Dhanuka, the owner of Riga sugar factory in Sitamarhi district. The Lok Sabha member asked the trader to meet her at Sitamarhi circuit house personally. When Dhanuka refused to do so, she asked him to arrange at least Rs 5 lakh for the BJP’s Hoonkar rally.

The rally, which is scheduled to be held at Patna’s historic Gandhi Maidan, is perceived to be a show of strength by the BJP in general and Narendra Modi in particular ever since the saffron party severed its alliance with the ruling Janata Dal (United).

The sugar mill owner told the parliamentarian over phone that he was not in a position to dole out such a huge sum as his sugar mill was running losses. “Such is the huge loss in my sugar factory that I have not been able to pay the farmers who supplied sugarcane. Where is the question of giving money for rally?” Dhanuka is reported to have told Rama Devi. Enraged over his refusal to cough up the ‘extortion sum’, the woman parliamentarian threatened to get Dhanuka arrested. Dhanuka has lodged an FIR against the BJP MP in which he has complained that Rama Devi threatened that she would get him arrested and ensure that the sugar mill is closed down if he failed to dole out money for the BJP rally.

Meanwhile, Rama Devi, who denied the extortion charge, also lodged a counter-FIR against the mill owner alleging that Dhanuka misbehaved with her when she enquired from him why sugarcane farmers had not been paid their dues