Akhilesh criticises Adityanath, BJP govts in state & Centre

Lucknow: Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav on Tuesday said Uttar Pradesh chief minister Yogi Adityanath was not a real yogi who "understands others' pain".

"When we see actions of the CM, we don't feel that he is a real yogi. If you read teachings if Lord Krisha, Guru Nanak ji and others you understand the real definition of a yogi. The real yogi is one who understands others' pain as his own ('Jo dusron ke dukh ko apna samjhe'). Does he understand the pain of youths, farmers and others. He is not a yogi.." Yadav said.

He was addressing a programme at his home town Saifai in Etawah district on Republic Day, where party workers gathered at the venue on tractors to show their support to farmers agitating against the Centre's new agri laws.

Yadav said due to the coronavirus pandemic everyone had covered their mouths and nose with masks, but he could not understand from which "disease" the BJP was suffering as it has closed its "eyes and ears" and could not hear the woes of farmers and the common man.

He said that the three contentious agri laws were passed without a majority in the House. Yadav said when the Bills were presented in the Rajya Sabha, SP leader Ram Gopal Yadav had said "this is not a bill but a death warrant of farmers".

"They are giving everything in the hands of a few people. The real India lies in our villages. When we demand withdrawal of the farm laws, they (BJP) say we are political people and agitating for coming to power. I congratulate farmers of Punjab and Haryana due to whom farmers of the entire country are now aware of their position," he said.

The protesting farmers are being termed as "terrorists" and "Khalistani", Yadav said and asked the BJP why its members were eating food grains produced by farmers if they were terrorists. He accused the BJP of spreading "hatred and lies" and not discussing their work. "They talk of religion and caste and create hatred by spreading lies when we ask them to discuss works done by them," he said.

Like in the US, where politics of "hatred and lies" got defeated, in India too such politics will taste defeat, Yadav said, adding that the BJP does politics by "threating" the

opposition.