Bengaluru: Sensing the possibility of early elections to the Legislative Assembly, leaders of the state unit of BJP on Thursday asked the cadre to don the war paint and drum up support for the party besides stepping up pressure on the state government to enhance the amount of farm loans to be written off in order to benefit more farmers.
At a meeting of with district unit presidents and general secretaries held here, the state leadership instructed the cadre to get ready to face elections in December 2017, and use the next four months for activities such as the 15-day compulsory camps in all 224 constituencies over the next four months. The party also decided to conduct last two rounds of survey to finalize candidates. The survey would be conducted after party president Amit Shah’s visit to Karnataka in the first week of August, 2017. The leaders were of the opinion that polls could be advanced to coincide with those in Gujarat in view of the state government’s announcement to write off crop loans up Rs 50,000 for the benefit of more than 2.2 million farmers. The leaders also believed Chief Minister Siddaramaiah’s populist schemes and a slew of announcements to please voters of all communities were also signs of early polls.
The leaders, however, felt that they could not rake up any major issue, including corruption, against the ruling Congress before polls and therefore it would be ideal to demand farm loans of higher amount. “Since the state government has partially waved farmers loan when compared with the governments in Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra and Punjab have given big relief to farmers, we have decided to organize protest rallies across the state demanding government to wave full loans borrowed by farmers. Present relief will help only small and marginal farmers, but it will not help farmers who borrowed loans more than Rs one lakh", Opposition leader in the Council, K.S. Eshwarappa told Deccan Chronicle.
Meanwhile, state unit president, B S Yeddyurappa, has asked district unit leaders to induct SC/STs leaders into the party, and also requested the party district cadre to register new voters who attained the age of 18.
Mr Yeddyurappa said at the meeting that leaders of all communities especially OBCs, SCs/STs should be inducted into the party fold without any riders. He also cautioned that newcomers have been proclaimed as candidates for Assembly elections, but the party has not given any assurance to the leaders who joined the party recently, he added.
Mr Yeddyurappa instructed the cadre to spend 15-days time in each constituency before July 25. “There is no excuse for abstaining from Vistara program. We have to win 150 seats in Assembly elections, and the party cadre should work to achieve this goal,” he added.
