Varun Gandhi posts video of UP man setting fire to crop, seeks agri policy rethink

New Delhi: BJP MP Varun Gandhi on Saturday shared a video clip purportedly showing a man setting fire to a heap of paddy crop after his vain efforts to sell it, and sought a rethink of the agriculture policy. Gandhi shared the video of the man on Twitter.

"A farmer from Uttar Pradesh - Samodh Singh - was going from mandi (wholesale market) to mandi for 15 days trying to sell his crop. After failing to do so, in desperation, he burned his entire crop," Mr Gandhi wrote as he shared the video.

The video shows a man - presumably Mr Singh - throwing kerosene on his crop and, despite some trying to hold him back, he sets fire to the whole thing.

Without making a direct attack, the BJP leader has been critical of the government's handling of agri issues of late and has also sympathised with the farmers protesting against the three farm laws.

"What has this system reduced farmers to? We need to rethink our agriculture policy," Mr Gandhi said, who is the only BJP leader, so far, to speak up on the Lakhimpur Kheri deaths, for which Ashish Mishra, the son of Union Minister Ajay Mishra, is an accused and is in jail.

The BJP MP has been particularly critical of his party in UP; on Thursday he tweeted photos of floods in the state's Terai region and slammed the Yogi Adityanath administration.

"Much of the Terai is flooded. Donating dry rations by hand so no family is hungry till this calamity ends. It is painful that when the common man needs the system the most, he is left to fend for himself. If every response is individual-led then what does 'governance' mean?"

The farmers' months-long protest against the centre's new farm laws has formed the backdrop for a series of hostile clashes between the ruling BJP and the opposition, including a fierce stand-off in Parliament that included physical confrontations in the final week