Pravash Pradhan
PostNews Network
New Delhi, April 19: Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi has raised the Niyamgiri mining issue as a major point of his speech at the farmers’ rally held in Ramlila Grounds here Sunday to protest against the Centre’s land acquisition bill. Addressing the mega rally, he urged party workers to oppose the land bill tooth and nail and highlight the “injustice” being meted out to tribals and farmers.
“The Congress will firmly stand with the farmers whenever their land is being snatched ….. As we won in Niayamgiri and as we introduced the land bill in 2013, we will win this fight also,” said the Congress leader. The Nehru family scion also said that a group of tribal youths had told him during an interaction earlier that they would join the Maoist movement in that region if the mining in Niyamgiri was not be stopped.
Rahul’s visit to Niyamgiri is learnt to have resulted in denying the mining lease to Vedanta.
He however launched a blistering attack on the Modi government, terming its policies anti-farmer. The rally organised to protest the Centre’s land acquisition bill was billed by the party as a grand ‘comeback event’ of Rahul Gandhi.
Several groups of farmers from Uttar Pradesh, Haryana, Punjab, Uttarakhand and Delhi had turned up to add strength to the rally and up the ante against the land acquisition bill.
