This story is from April 16, 2019

National security major issue for Purnia, Katihar farmers

National security major issue for Purnia, Katihar farmers
Representative image
GERABARI (KATIHAR): The farmers of Purnia and Katihar parliamentary constituencies have been volubly rooting for PM Narendra Modi, especially for his twin planks of hyper nationalism and national security. They have capitalized on extensive banana farming for the last two decades and have now been gradually shifting to maize, makhana and other cash crops.
Also, the rich farmers and transporters together, who are well networked for obvious economic reasons in the two adjoining constituencies, also constitute the local opinion makers.
Gerabari is the hub for the transporters who attend to the needs and demands of farmers in the 50km radius. The manifest central point of their political concerns is “national security and the need for safe (Indo-Pak) border”.
To exacerbate their anxiety though, they would have liked the BJP to contest the Purnia and Katihar seats. However, under the 17:17:6 seat-sharing formula among the BJP, JD(U) and Lok Janshakti Party (LJP) headed by Ram Vilas Paswan, the BJP has ceded the two seats to the JD(U) led by CM Nitish Kumar.
In the situation, JD(U) nominee in Purnia is its sitting MP Santosh Kumar Kushwaha pitched against Uday Singh alias Pappu Singh of Congress. First runner-up to Kushwaha in Purnia from the BJP in the 2014 election, Uday joined the Congress last month because the seat had gone to JD(U).
JD(U) has fielded former MLA Dulal Chand Goswami in Katihar against its sitting MP Tariq Anwar, now a Congress nominee. Tariq quit the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) led by Sharad Pawar last year.
Implicitly, the JD(U) nominees would get the votes of the BJP cadres and supporters in the name of PM Modi. Otherwise, the transfer of the two seats to JD(U) has angered the BJP cadres and its supporters, as a result of which the two Congress candidates have also been expecting their “silent support” on the polling day. Its symptoms showed in the field as well.

Anant Kumar is a well-known transporter at Gerabari. His firm carries agricultural produce to the markets. Initially, he was reluctant to talk about politics. “No, don’t talk to me about politics, not even elections. You can discuss anything else,” he said, rather censoriously. Then, after discussing popularity of various cash crops among the farmers over the last three decades, he yielded with a smile, “I will vote for JD(U) in the name of the one (allusion to PM Modi) who has broad chest, strong arms and can assure national security and safe border.”
However, the rich and not-so-rich farmers were comparatively more voluble in revealing their political choice. Hari Singh, Tiku Singh and several others from Chandwa village in Falka block in Katihar would vote for the JD(U) nominee in the name of national security and safe border with Pakistan. It is another matter, though, that the supporters of Tariq and Pappu were also there in the village.
This pattern of political reflexes extends to the entire length and breadth of the two constituencies where the rich farmers cultivate cash crops like banana, maize, makhana, jute, potato and peanuts, besides doing bamboo plantation on a large scale. A travel by road through state highways of Kursela-Forbesganj, Chandpur-Rupauli-Purnia and Katihar-Manihari, besides NH-31, amply exhibited the trend.
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