Farmers & lawyers meet Min to discuss issue of power subsidy

New Delhi: The Delhi government under the leadership of CM Arvind Kejriwal will continue to work towards ensuring that all citizens of the city have access to basic amenities, including affordable electricity, and will not allow any conspiracy to disrupt this goal, Power minister Atishi said during her interaction with farmers from rural areas and lawyers of Delhi on Friday.

During the meeting, the Power minister reassured the farmers and lawyers that regardless of the number of alleged conspiracies hatched by the L-G and BJP, the Delhi government under CM Kejriwal will not allow the power subsidy to be stopped for anyone.

Sharing more details, she said, “A proposal to stop the power subsidy to farmers was received from the Power Department officials yesterday. On being questioned about the proposal the officials replied that there is huge pressure from LG and BJP leaders to stop this power subsidy.”

She added that the proposal to stop the power subsidy for farmers and lawyers was put forward and presented without any directive from either the Power minister or the elected government of Delhi.

Atishi continued, “No matter how many conspiracies are hatched and no matter who passes any file under pressure from L-G, free electricity for any resident of Delhi will not be stopped as long as CM Arvind Kejriwal’s government is in power.”

The representatives of the farmers stated that the farmers are the most marginalized section of the country, and the proposal brought by the BJP and the L-G indicates that they are completely anti-farmer. They said that there is massive outrage among the people of rural Delhi against this conspiracy to stop the power subsidy.

The advocates’ representatives said, “As soon as we got to know that our power subsidy is being stopped on the directions of L-G, we rushed to meet the Power Minister. She assured us that, till CM Arvind Kejriwal is in power, our power subsidies will never be stopped. This is a very crucial subsidy for us that has reduced our financial burden to a great extent. We will support the government in its every effort to continue this.”

Meanwhile, the Delhi BJP has demanded Chief Minister to provide compensation to farmers whose crops were damaged in recent unseasonal rain and hailstorms. In a letter to the chief minister, Delhi BJP chief Virendra Sachdeva said the farmers needed to be paid compensation of Rs 1 lakh per acre affected by the unseasonal rains and hail storm in the national Capital in recent days.

Sachdeva also demanded action against Power Minister Atishi for allegedly lying that farmers were provided free electricity in the city.