SARAWAAN (YAMUNANAGAR):A former Deputy Prime Minister and SJP President Devi Lal alleged here that the Gold Import Scheme was a conduit for laundering unaccounted money earned by certain politicians and brokers and deposited in foreign banks.

Addressing a public meeting _ Devi Lal said influential politicians and persons with a cut of 10% in various foreign deals wanted to bring back that money to India. To enable them to do so the Central “government devised the Gold Import Scheme. He alleged four important persons alone had imported gold worth Rs 75 crore in just four days.

Devi Lal addressed a series of meetings in Ambala and Yamunanagar as part of his “Chea Yatra.” He had undertaken the yatra to generate political awareness among farmers and laborers.

He said farmers had learned to store their produce. When the Lok Sabha was constituted in 1952 there were only five MPs who belonged to rural areas whereas now 353 MPs belonged to rural areas They were however elected with the help of capitalists That was why they failed to protect the interests of farmers when the prices of various agricultural inputs were increased by the government.

Devi Lal said on four occasions he experimented with forging unity among Opposition parties and made four Prime Ministers. Unfortunately every time his experiment failed. Now was the time for a direct fight between the “exploited” (kameras) and the “exploiters” (“luteras”).

He accused the BJP of wrecking the Opposition government by raising the mandir issue when it remained silent on the issue during the British and Congress rules. Devi Lal said the people should have the right to recall their elected representatives from the assemblies and Parliament. Only then the MPs and MLAs would discharge their duties faithfully He advocated that the party ticket should be allowed on local recommendations.

He regretted that the present government had dropped a proposal initiated by him as the Union Agriculture Minister to give agencies of agricultural inputs to farmers alone

Devi Lal was accompanied by Ajay Chautala General Secretary of the Haryana SJP. Sampat Singh leader of the Opposition in the Assembly Makhan Singh Ashok Kumar .

Article extracted from this publication >> June 5, 1992