BJP accused of indulging in ‘vegetable politics’
By IANSWednesday, February 9, 2011
PANAJI - Goa Youth Congress leaders Wednesday accused the BJP of indulging in “vegetable politics”, saying that saffron-aligned wholesalers in Karnataka were thwarting attempts by the Goa government to source cheap vegetables from Belgaum town.
Goa Youth Congress leaders Wednesday threatened to block the entry of trucks laden with vegetables from Belgaum, one of the biggest trading towns in northern Karnataka, if the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in Karnataka did not stop the “vegetable politics”.
The BJP is indulging in vegetable politics. Traders aligned to their party on Tuesday destroyed vegetables worth Rs.15 lakh, sourced cheap by the Goa Horticulture Corporation (GHC) for sale in in the state, Goa Youth Congress vice president Janardhan Bhandari told reporters.
State chief secretary Sanjiv Srivastava has dispatched a delegation to the Belgaum wholesale market to sort out the impasse between the vegetable traders’ group there and the GHC.
The government-run GHC has more that 400 vegetable outlets spread across the state, where veggies are sold at a lesser price as compared to the standard rates in the states markets.
According to the Goa Youth Congress, the GHCs attempts to source and sell cheap vegetables in the Goa markets had unsettled the vegetable mafia, which was selling veggies sourced from Belgaum at a cheap price.
On Thursday, youth Congress members will picket at all border check-posts. We will not allow trucks carrying vegetables from Belgaum to enter the state, Bhandari said.
A vegetable deficient state, vegetable industry insiders say that virtually 90 percent of the fresh vegetable produce sold in Goa is sourced from Belgaum, located some 120 km from here.
–Indo Asian News Service
