What happened to promise of drought-free 7/12, Congress asks Fadnavis

Drought conditions in Maharashtra have turned severe, with the situation said to be worse than the drought of 1972. Farmers are in deep distress and looking to the government for help, but the BJP-led Fadnavis government has so far only been going through the motions. Seeing farmers' anger, the chief minister himself eventually visited a dam in a farming area, but Congress senior spokesperson Atul Londhe questioned what good this would do.

Speaking on the chief minister's drought visit, Atul Londhe said a speech can only serve politics, but does not show the courage to face the real situation, and the same has to be said of the BJP-Mahayuti government. He said Devendra Fadnavis has repeated many times that the next generation of Marathwada will not have to see drought. Londhe said the chief minister going to a farmers' dam today is a good thing and he welcomes it. He said the chief minister himself has called this the biggest drought since 1972, but the Congress government had learnt from the 1972 drought and that led to the Employment Guarantee Scheme, which gave employment to lakhs of hands. The same scheme was later adopted by the central government, turned into law, and became MGNREGA. During COVID too, this same MGNREGA provided employment, but the BJP government has continuously worked to weaken it. According to Londhe, MGNREGA's funds have been cut sharply, and the BJP government is now working to end the scheme itself.

Atul Londhe said the state has seen heavy rain and drought before as well, and the chief minister should himself ask farmers how much the BJP government has really helped them. He said the loan waiver announced by the BJP-Mahayuti government also turned out to be a cheat, which is what farmers will say. Londhe asked whether the BJP government will learn from this, whether it will do anything new, and what concrete plans the government has to deal with drought. He also asked what happened to the 49,000-crore rupee water grid scheme announced in 2014. He said many schemes for farmers were brought in and implemented during the Congress government's time. When Sharad Pawar was chief minister, a horticulture scheme suited to low water use was introduced, after which Maharashtra saw a major revolution in food processing.

According to Londhe, nothing of this kind has been visible in agriculture during the BJP government's 12 years in power. He said the chief minister has gone to the dam today and would have seen farmers' problems up close and understood their distress, so perhaps something good will come of it, but he hoped it would not turn out to be the same old story again. This was stated by Congress senior spokesperson Atul Londhe.