Shillong, Meghalaya

A ‘beef party’ and a bandh greeted BJP president Amit Shah who visited the state today as part of his north-east tour seeking to strengthen party base and urging workers to make public the alleged corruption by ruling Congress party in Meghalaya.

While the beef party was organised by the Thma U Rangli Juki (TUR), a pressure group led by Christian leader, the bandh was imposed by the proscribed militant group, the Hynniewtrep National Liberation Council.

Leaders of the TUR and the Hynniewtrep National People’s Front (HNPF), Khasi National Union (KNU) organised the beef party near the party’s office in the city as the BJP president arrived to address party workers and to hold meeting with regional political parties.

Security personnel were seen having a tough time trying to stop the members of the NGOs who attempted to take out a protest march to the state’s Conventional Hall, where Shah was convening a party meeting.

The activists had intended to hold a beef party in front of the convention hall as a mark of protest against BJP promotion of ban on beef but for the timely intervention of the administration.

Speaking on the sideline of the protest, TUR leader Angela Rngad said, “We are here to protest the coming of Amit Shah to our peaceful and loving town as he symbolises the BJP and all of their anti-people policies is something which we will not tolerate.”

Terming the BJP and its functionaries as “ambassadors of hate”, Rngad also said, “the protest is also to show that we are against all of their hate campaigns whether it is their ‘Ghar Wapsi’ and other policies like the grabbing of farmers land, ‘Make in India’ campaign, which intends to make all of us slaves.”

KNU general secretary S Diengdoh said that this “indifferent attitude” of the BJP against minorities, including Christians, was totally undemocratic and also totally against the constitution of India.

On Amit Shah’s address

Meanwhile, Shah sought making public the “corruption” indulged by the ruling Congress party in the state.

Addressing party workers at the state convention hall, Shah, who is touring the eight states of the north-eastern region, encouraged party workers to work hard and expose the misdeeds of the Congress-led coalition government in Meghalaya and lay the foundation for forming a BJP government in the next state elections.

Shah, who arrived in Shillong today along with national general secretary Ram Madhav, told party workers, “If the successive Congress governments in the state had faithfully and honestly utilised the funds given to them by the central government then there would not have been any poor people in Meghalaya.”

Shah informed the party workers that there were now around 20,000 BJP workers in the state and they need to work hard and follow all the centrally sponsored projects that are awarded to the state government and expose corrupt practises, if any.

Shah also said that now the dream of making the north-eastern region at par with other developed regions of the nation can be fulfilled with the BJP and Prime Minister Narendra Modi at the helms of affairs in Delhi.

“But for this to happen, the north eastern states will have to make the BJP strong and the party will bring 100 per cent grants to the north-eastern states,” he said.

Speaking about the BJP’s commitment for development of the north-eastern region, Shah said the Modi-led NDA government has sanctioned Rs 100 crore to set up a sports university in Manipur and also to set up a 127 MW power project in Meghalaya.

Informing party workers of the NE specific project undertaken by the BJP government at the centre, Shah said the union government has initiated construction of hostels for the welfare of NE students in Bangalore, Delhi University and JNU.

He said to keep the culture and arts of the north-eastern region alive in Delhi, the BJP government had also organised the NE festival in the national capital recently.

The 12-hour bandh also evoked mixed responses with banking and educational institutions besides most shops remaining closed.

– PTI