People in rural India are angry with Narendra Modi ("We voted for Modi but he stabbed us in the back")

by Guest Wed Apr 01, 2015 1:24 pm

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Modis-popularity-in-rural-India-punctured-by-discontent-suicides/articleshow/46732930.cms

Babu Singh, who had run up debts amounting to $13,000, soaked himself in kerosene and set himself on fire on March 19. He succumbed to burn injuries six days later.

"My brother was banking on the crop so the loss came as the last straw," Dharmendra Singh said in his village, Vaidi, 185 km southeast of Delhi.

"For God's sake why hasn't the government reached out to us? We overwhelmingly voted for Modi as he promised to take care of us but he has stabbed us in the back."

In more than a dozen villages visited by Reuters this week across the state that sends the most lawmakers to parliament, farmers said there was a "crisis" in the countryside, where 70 percent of India's 1.2 billion people live.

Angered by low farmgate prices and the lack of state compensation for crop damage, some villagers said they have ostracised local members of the BJP and barred them from attending weddings.

Parties crushed by the BJP in last year's general election have coupled the discontent with street protests against a land acquisition bill that will make it easier for businesses to buy farmland, a potent issue in the countryside.

For the BJP, the next major election will be in November in the large, mostly rural state of Bihar, and a poor performance will be a huge setback.

The states send representatives to the Rajya Sabha in parliament, where the BJP is struggling to form a majority to match its domination of the Lok Sabha....

Modi tried to address the issue in a radio address last week, arguing that the land bill would help create rural jobs. But in the villages of Uttar Pradesh, farmers were not impressed.

"Instead of ensuring some concrete help to farmers, especially after rains this month, Modi and his government are spending time and energy on the land bill," said Buddha Singh, a district chief of the Bharatiya Kisan Union, a leading farmers' body.

The turnaround is dramatic - Modi swept Uttar Pradesh last year, winning 73 of 80 seats with rural voters swayed by a promise to pay high crop prices along with religious tensions that favoured his Hindu nationalist party.

Now the same farmers say they regret their support.

"Modi has let us down. We have decided to socially boycott BJP politicians, including lawmakers we elected," said Jitendra Kumar, a farmer in Sisola Khurd village.

"Some of us had joined BJP as part of its membership drive but we are now going to surrender it."