Rahul trains kisan anger against Modi

New Delhi (Agencies): Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi led a large farmers rally on Sunday that focused rural anger toward Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s policies, in the first public appearance in months for the elusive scion of the Gandhi family.

In what seemed like a stage-managed appearance, the Opposition leader spoke to thousands of villagers brought to New Delhi on special trains and buses, vowing to block Modi’s plan to make it easier for business to forcibly acquire farm land.“Modiji wants to give your land to industrialist friends,” said a hoarse-voiced Gandhi, addressing some 70,000 farmers in the large ‘Ram Lila’ ground.

While Congress president Sonia Gandhi accused the government of rubbing salt on the wounds of the farmers hit hard by unseasonal rains and hailstorm, former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said the new Land Bill was nothing but an attempt to weaken the 2013 Act that was aimed at empowering the farmers. Anger at the Land Bill, bad weather and low commodity prices have dented Modi’s popularity in the countryside, his first major political challenge since taking office last year.

Gandhi, 44, landed in India on Friday after a mysterious eight-week foreign break that led to rebellious grumbling from party colleagues that the great-grandson of India’s first prime minister was a part-timer with dulled political instincts. The rally was Gandhi’s attempt to regain momentum and put the government on the defensive about its support for farmers suffering after bad weather damaged crop.

Flanked on stage by his mother, party president Sonia Gandhi and former prime minister Manmohan Singh, Rahul Gandhi said Modi was undemocratic in using a decree to implement the new land rules. The government must now pass the amendments in parliament, which convenes on Monday.