BJP wooing residents with Centre’s welfare initiatives

With the zila parishad and block samiti elections round the corner, the district’s Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP) leadership has started an extensive campaign in the rural areas to woo the voters. Party leaders are voicing slogan ‘Vote for BJP Save Punjab’. This is for the first time BJP is contesting zila parishad elections independently and the results may also pave way for the party’s entry into the state’s rural bodies, should they become successful.

During the door-to-door campaign, party leaders are counting on the Centre’s welfare schemes, benefits of which they claim have been trickling down to every villager.

Although the BJP is not contesting all the seats in the district in these two polls, yet the party leaders are enthusiastic about winning as they have not faced any protest or resistance from the residents till now. The BJP candidates were not allowed to hold campaigns smoothly during the last Assembly and Lok Sabha elections. Even Ravneet Singh Bittu had faced major protests from residents during the parliamentary polls and was not allowed to carry out his canvassing programme by farm activists.

BJP Spokesperson Pritpal Singh Baliawal, who is the in-charge for the upcoming polls for Gill and Sahnewal constituencies, said meetings with party workers had been going on for some days and now a door-to-door campaign had been initiated to woo the voters.

“We are apprising the villagers about the Centre’s welfare schemes. Those who are not aware about the schemes are being enrolled so that they could benefit,” Baliawal added.

Schemes like the Ayushman Card for free treatment up to Rs 5 lakh, new and upgraded railway stations, construction of roads and highways, providing wheat at Rs 2 per kg in Punjab, free and subsidised gas cylinders for the poor, a subsidy of up to Rs 2.50 for those who do not have their own house, scheme to provide loans between Rs 10,000 and Rs 3 lakh and up to the MSME limit for ‘Har Ghar Rozgar’ (Employment for Every Household) at a low rate without collateral, and sending direct money to farmers’ accounts by eliminating middlemen were a gift from the Central Government, Baliawal further said.

Raminder Sangowal, in-charge for Jagraon and its neighbouring areas, said as in a day or two, the campaign would get a major boost as senior BJP leaders might join the campaign.

Tajinder Singh Sran, executive member, BJP Punjab, posted as election in-charge of Samrala and Machhiwara, said the party had printed pamphlets mentioning the welfare schemes for distribution.

“There are many more schemes from which Punjabis are deprived, which could make them prosper and put the state on the path to progress,” Sran added.

Nomination ‘junked’ over pregnancy

Local BJP leaders said the wife of the former sarpanch of Samrala’s Khirnia village, Hardeep Kaur’s Zila Parishad nomination was rejected by the returning officers citing an allegedly ‘illogical’ excuse of her pregnancy. They said she remained committed to contesting the polls.