Lucknow: Accusing the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) of spreading lies about women's quota, Samajwadi Party (SP) president Akhilesh Yadav on Saturday asserted that the women reservation bill was passed in the Lok Sabha in 2023 itself. He alleged that the BJP is unwilling to approve the bill because it "does not want to give reservation to women."
"The entire BJP is out to spread lies about the women quota bill. The Women Reservation Bill was passed in the Lok Sabha in 2023 itself. The Bill has been notified as well. But today the BJP is not ready to accept it," Akhilesh said, adding that the BJP has come to lie before women about the status of reservation. "The BJP does not want to give reservation to women and spread misinformation instead," Akhilesh stated during a press conference at the SP headquarters on Saturday. He accused the BJP of indulging in propaganda on women's reservation.
Referring to the Ghazipur incident related to the death of a girl from the Vishwakarma community, Akhilesh said the family was not allowed to take home the body of the deceased for the last rites. "The police did exactly what they had done in the Hathras case," he said, adding that now local BJP leaders and police were trying to pressurise and lure the victim's father. "Policemen are sitting at the victim's house with a team of politicians. It needs to be probed as to who all went to exert pressure on the victim's father to give statements that suit the powers that be," Akhilesh said. He tweeted a video in which the victim's father could be heard rejecting offers of compensation and questioning the police for not doing enough to get a confession from the accused. Akhilesh also tweeted another video of the victim's father in which he could be heard saying that he was satisfied with the police action and also disapproved of political activists indulging in stone pelting at his doorstep.
Rising Farmer Distress Concerning: SP Chief
Lucknow: Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav on Saturday presided over the latest edition of the Vision India conclave focusing on the plight of farmers and summed up his interaction with agriculturists to claim that farmers were a harried lot and rising distress among them was concerning. The conclave was held in Ghaziabad, and Akhilesh joined the meeting through video conferencing from the party headquarters. He said the feedback he received from farmers indicated that they were badly hit by inadequate supply of quality seeds and fertilizers at cooperative and government outlets. Farmers were forced to buy everything at higher prices. Along with Akhilesh, former cabinet minister Rajendra Chaudhary, retired IAS and former chief secretary Alok Ranjan, and senior party functionary Prof. Sudhir Panwar also addressed the participants.
