Mumbai: Prime Minister Narendra Modi's younger brother Prahlad Modi participated in an agitation against Central government in Mumbai on Monday.
The agitation held in Azad Maidan, saw Prahlad Modi, the national vice-president of All-India Fair Price Shop Dealers' Federation, voicing in favor of ration distributors.
The star-attraction of the programme, Prahlad, in a 45-minute speech, said that BJP would lose in Bihar and Uttar Pradesh elections if the federations' demands were not met.
He, on behalf, of the federation demanded an increase in the commission for rationing distributors and an assurance that each distributor will have at least 1000 cardholders.
Avoiding attacking his brother in the speech, Prahlad raised fingers on the policies and the system.
He said, “Over 75,000 rationing distributors worked for BJP in the Lok Sabha election in UP, which resulted in the party winning 73 of the 80 seats in the state. But for the Delhi assembly polls, they worked against BJP, and it won only three of the 70 seats. If the Central government does not meet our demands, then the BJP will lose the Bihar and Uttar Pradesh assembly elections.”
As published in a report of Times of India, he described a section of government officials as thieves and blamed their policies to have forced them (rationing distributors) also to become thieves.
He said, “Woh bade chor hain, hum chhote chor hain. (They are big thieves and we are small thieves.) In fact, their policies have forced us to become thieves."
In order to shield his brother, he even went ahead and said that his fight was against the policy and the system. He said, “I respect him (Narendra Modi). Our fight is not against him, but the system. Media is trying to drive a wedge between us."
When some of the federation leaders started shouting slogans and demanded the resignation of food and consumer affairs' minister, Ram Vilas Paswan, he stood up and said that he did not want Paswan's resignation.
He disagreed with the rest of the group and said that if Paswan resigns, some other person will be the minister. He said that their fight is not against him but the system.
He further clarified that UPA government cleared the Food Security Bill and implemented it without any proper survey. He demanded that now the BJP government should stay the bill and conduct proper surveys, keeping in mind the rights of the ration distributors.
