OBC status for Ghansali ploy to fool people: BJP

DEHRADUN: A day after Bhim Lal Arya’s high-voltage protest outside the chief minister’s residence came to a dramatic end, the state BJP leaders alleged that the ex-MLA’s demand for an Other Backward Class (OBC) status to Ghansali is a ploy to fool people of Uttarakhand.
Talking to TOI, Munna Singh Chauhan, BJP spokesperson, said, “I personally find the entire sequence of events strange.A sulking former MLA cries for OBC status of the region and the CM says he will do something. Both of them know that this cannot be done overnight then why are they fooling the people of Uttarakhand?”
BJP leaders said that CM Rawat may have struck some “inside deal” with Arya so that he would call off his protest.
State BJP head Ajay Bhatt said, “No place or region can be granted OBC or backward status without the intervention of the central government and unless several factors and criteria are looked into. The manner in which Arya is cozying up to the CM clearly shows that some deal has been struck between them.”
Ghansali, a reserve constituency in Tehri district, has a population of 1 lakh. Arya won from the seat in 2012 assembly elections.
Meanwhile, locals in Ghansali are divided over the issue of granting OBC status to the region. Local resident Rajender Painuli said, “Without a survey or assessment of the targeted population and without the involvement of people from Ghansali, this is just a farce. The place needs development and better facilities.”
Another local resident, Anil Negi, said that many places in Chamoli district and other far-off bordering areas, have been granted backward status in the past but it has not helped.