Varun Gandhi takes divergent stand from BJP on farmers' issue
BJP Lok Sabha member Varun Gandhi has displayed his rebellious streak yet again as he shared a video that appears to show farmers being run over by an SUV purportedly in Uttar Pradesh's Lakhimpur Kheri district and called for immediate arrests of the culprits.
“The video of deliberate mowing down of farmers under vehicles in Lakhimpur Kheri will shake anyone's soul,” said Gandhi, who represents Pilibhit parliamentary seat in the Lok Sabha.
He asked the police to take note of the video, identify the owners of the vehicles, persons travelling in the same and others involved and make immediate arrests,” he said at a time when BJP leaders were targeting the SP and Congress for the violence.
This is the second consecutive day that Gandhi has taken a stand that is different from the BJP. On Monday, he had written a letter to Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, asking him to pay Rs 1 crore as compensation to the next of the kin of the farmers who were killed.
Gandhi had also asked the CM to order a Supreme Court-monitored CBI inquiry into the incident and arrest the culprits on charges of murder.
Earlier too, Gandhi had taken a divergent stand from the BJP and demanded higher remunerative price for sugarcane growers after the Uttar Pradesh government fixed the fair and remunerative price (FRP) for sugarcane at Rs 350 per quintal.
Gandhi had asked the chief minister to add Rs 50 as bonus from the state government and pay cane growers Rs 400 per quintal.
Gandhi, who was National General Secretary of the BJP in the pre-Narendra Modi era, has been sidelined in the party since 2014. He was stripped of the party responsibilities in 2014 and has been a Lok Sabha member since then.
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