Rohtak (Haryana): All India Jat Arakshan Sangharsh Samiti (AIJASS) president Yashpal Malik’s rally in Rohtak’s Jassia village got a major boost with INLD leader Abhay Chautala backing the community’s demand for quota and Union minister of steel Birender Singh sharing the dais at the venue.
The rally, which was organised to lay foundation stone of an education institute the AIJASS is constructing for the Jat community at Jassia, was given a miss by the Haryana Congress leaders, including former chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda.
The rally had Abhay Chautala and AIJASS’s Malik and Ashok Balhara bashing chief minister Manohar Lal Khattar and the BJP government for betraying the Jat community and planning large-scale violence in Haryana, even as senior BJP leader Birender Singh watched in silence.
“CM Khattar says he wants to help Jats, but does nothing to grant reservation or withdraw cases against the Jat youths,” Abhay said. Addressing the rally, Malik warned the Jats will choke Delhi again with their tractors if Khattar did not fulfil their pending demands by December.
The INLD leader didn’t mince words and attacked Birender as well, asking him where he was when his government was killing innocent Jat youths last year. He also announced £1,00,000 donation for the educational institute and promised all Jat youths arrested in the quota violence cases will be out of jail within 36 hours of his party being voted back to power.
Birender, in his address, offered no defence for CM Khattar, the BJP government or even himself. He said he supported reservation for the Jat community and will ensure it is given at all cost. Being steel minister, he also promised to donate steel required in building the educational institute for Jats.
Earlier in the day, the National Highway-71 A (Rohtak-Panipat road) remained choked due to the rally. Around 3,500 police personnel were deployed to keep a check on the situation. The rally, however, passed off peacefully.
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