Upliftment of poor was not in SP, BSP's agenda: Adityanath

Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath on Sunday hit out at the previous Samajwadi Party and Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) governments in the state, saying that they were not concerned with the plight of the poor and that it was not in their respective agendas.

After laying the foundation stone of several projects here, Adityanath questioned the previous governments on the poor not receiving any benefit of the welfare schemes of the Centre.

"We have brought several schemes for the poor. These schemes were approved by the Central government long back, but the poor never received their benefit. This is because the previous governments were never concerned about the plight of the poor," Adityanath said, while addressing a gathering here.

Adityanath further said that around 33 lakh ration cards, which were illegally used by the Samajwadi Party and the BSP leaders, have been scrapped, and added that the cards were allotted to other people to let them avail the benefits of government's schemes.

"We will not let anyone snatch away the rights of the poor," he said.

The chief minister asserted that his government had planned several projects worth Rs. 18 crore for the upliftment of the Bundelkhand region.

He assured that the two major issues in Bundelkhand - water scarcity and agrarian crisis - would be resolved as soon as possible.

"We will not keep Bundelkhand thirsty, no matter how much money we have to spend for it. We will also try to provide sufficient amount of water for irrigation purposes too," he said.

Adityanath also said that around Rs. 2,800 crore have been allocated for providing clean drinking water to the people of the state and that the state government was installing 110 new tubewells in the region.

Adityanath also directed for the constitution of a committee for the protection of cows in the state.