PANJIM: Bharatiya Bhasha Suraksha Manch (BBSM) has warned it will campaign against the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) ahead of the 2017 Assembly elections if the State government fails to withdraw grants to Diocesan-backed schools that have English as the Medium of Instruction (MoI) in the primary section. The Marathi and Konkani lovers have also planned a series of meetings across the State to ‘expose the lies of BJP-led government’.
“BJP has to face the consequence for taking a complete U-turn on the issue after coming to power. Before the 2012 elections, it had shown its complete support to regional languages. BJP has taken the issue for granted. If the government does not withdraw grants to English medium primary schools, we will campaign against the BJP for the 2017 elections,” BBSM’s Arvind Bhatikar said at a press conference on Wednesday.
The group will hold a massive awareness camp in Panjim on Friday ‘to expose how BJP lied to the people of Goa’. This will be followed by corner meetings across Goa in February-March. “We will distribute pamphlets to the people that will contain all what BJP assured in the election manifesto and its U-turn thereafter. The BJP has backstabbed the Goans,” BBSM leader Subhash Velingkar said.
BBSM had openly backed the BJP before the 2012 Assembly polls and has now turned into a critic over the MoI issue. This was evident when Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar, in a recent meeting of BJP workers, asked party members to disassociate from forums that slam the government, a comment that certainly referred to BBSM too.
The group condemned the so-called advice given by Parrikar stating it was a clear indication that the BJP leadership is panic stricken at the fast-spreading agitation and its inevitable threat to the government in the upcoming polls. “Parrikar would himself participate in the BBSM agitation when he was the leader of opposition in the Goa Assembly,” he said, adding that the party was misleading the people.
While it did not rule out the possibility of moving the courts seeking stoppage of grants to English medium primary schools, Velingkar rubbished allegations by BJP that BBSM leaders intended to contest the forthcoming elections. “BJP takes U-turn, not BBSM. We have no intention to fight elections. Only BJP can try all the tricks to come to power,” he added.
