A week after the Chief Minister and his Cabinet colleagues undertook a fast to protest against alleged discrimination by the Centre, the Congress has decided to take to the streets on the issue of corruption in Madhya Pradesh.The party has also come out in defence of the UPA Government saying the discrimination charge did not hold water because the BJP Government in Madhya Pradesh was misleading the public by resorting to misinformation and propaganda.A series of block-level protests will begin on May 12 and go on till May 20 across the state to expose the rampant corruption, MPCC chief Suresh Pachauri told reporters on Thursday. The main protest will be held in Bhopal on May 13.The party will continue to harp on the dumper scam demanding Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan’s resignation on moral grounds, especially after registration of an FIR by the Lokayukta.Quoting a recent judgment of the Madhya Pradesh High Court, Pachauri said the verdict vindicated the party’s stand that Chouhan had favoured J P Associates by misusing his position and was rewarded in the form of ‘dumpers’. The party has also demanded that the mining minister be sacked immediately in the wake of the court order. The high court had come down on the way a mining lease was awarded to a rival company after the lease given to another company was cancelled. The court said fresh applications should have been invited after the cancellation of the lease.Pachauri alleged that corruption cases were pending against at least eight ministers in the state and some others were also involved in a Rs 100-crore land scam in Indore.Giving figures, the party claimed that the allocation to the state during the UPA regime was much more than when the NDA coalition ruled the Centre.
