Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) Rajya Sabha MP Sandip Pathak on Tuesday said if his party is elected to power in Chhattisgarh in the year-end Assembly polls, farmers will get higher rates for paddy than what they are receiving under the incumbent Congress government. Speaking at the oath-taking ceremony of the newly-appointed office bearers of the AAP's Chhattisgarh unit here, he hit out at the Congress and the Opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), saying despite getting opportunities to rule the state, the two leading parties did nothing except "cheating" its people.
Pathak said Delhi Chief Minister and party's national convener Arvind Kejriwal and his Punjab counterpart Bhagwant Mann will address a rally in Bilaspur district on July 2. More than 4,300 newly-appointed office-bearers of the party were sworn in during the function held at a luxurious hotel in the outskirts of the state capital Raipur.
If the AAP is elected to power in the state, paddy procurement from farmers will be done at higher rates than what is being paid to cultivators under the present government, said Pathak, who hails from Chhattisgarh.
After the formation of Chhattisgarh in November 2000, the BJP and the Congress got multiple opportunities to rule, but both the parties "cheated" the people of the state, the AAP leader claimed. When Kejriwal can vastly improve the functioning of government schools in Delhi after getting one chance, why can't the BJP and the Congress do the same in Chhattisgarh?, he asked and went on to highlight the achievements of the AAP government in the National Capital Territory. The AAP tried its luck for the first time in Assembly elections in Chhattisgarh in 2018 and fielded candidates in 85 out of the total 90 seats, but failed to open its account.
(Published 31 May 2023, 02:39 IST)
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