Akhilesh doesn't talk about erecting Parshuram's statue anymore: Shiv Pratap Shukla

Former Union Minister of State for Finance Shiv Pratap Shukla on Tuesday took a dig at SP chief Akhilesh Yadav saying he has stopped talking about erecting an idol of Lord Parshuram, a deity of Brahmins, since his party's loss in the assembly polls.

"Despite the call given by the SP President of installing Parshuram ji's statue in the state before the Uttar Pradesh assembly elections, more than 90 per cent Brahmins supported and voted BJP. Now Akhilesh Yadav doesn't talk about installing an idol anywhere," the Rajya Sabha member from BJP told PTI here.

Shukla was here to attend a programme organised on the occasion of Parshuram Jayanti.

He said, “People should never turn their great men into leaders of any particular caste. BJP neither talked about installing the idol, nor is it doing it today. But BJP is committed to the principles of Parshuram ji. BJP talks about ending injustice and terrorism”.

In the run up to the latest assembly polls, Akhilesh Yadav had organised worship at a Lord Parshuram temple, while the then deputy chief minister Dinesh Sharma and other BJP leaders inaugurated a temple of of the deity in Lucknow.

The SP had also announced its plans of erecting a 108 ft tall statue of Lord Parshuram apparently to show respect to the Brahmin community.

Brahmin leader Abhishek Mishra had been given the task to oversee the statue work.

Speaking about the farmers' agitation over the now repealed farm bills, the former minister said that the laws would have benefitted the farmers but had to be scuttled because of middlemen.

“Almost 83 per cent of the farmers, especially small ones, would have benefitted from those laws but the agitation, propped up with the help of some middlemen, forced the government to withdraw them,” he said.

“There were others who were supporting the farmers' movement from the back door and the opposition was also extending its support to it.

“However, wherever elections were held, whether in Uttar Pradesh or in other states, the public showed that only Prime Minister Narendra Modi is a well-wisher of farmers and no one else," Shukla said.

Referring to the government's initiative for sugarcane farmers in UP, he said, “In Uttar Pradesh, khandsari units were taxed more than the sugar mills. As a Minister of State for Finance, I invited a proposal and worked to make Khandsari industry completely free from GST”.

He said such decisions helped BJP get majority in western Uttar Pradesh and form a government again despite all the efforts by the opposition.