New Delhi: About half a dozen directors of Amul Dairy gave the inauguration ceremony of the company’s Rs 533-crore premium chocolate plant – led by Prime Minister Modi – a miss claiming that the event was being hijacked by the BJP.
According to Indian Express, the company’s vice-chairman Rajendrasinh Parmar said he along with five other directors decided to skip the event held on Sunday at Morar in Gujarat’s Anand district because “Amul did not gain anything” from the function which ended up being a political event where leaders from only “one party were on the stage.”
However, chairperson Ramsinh Parmar — who had quit as a Congress MLA last year and joined BJP ahead of last year’s Assembly elections — along with other members of the board remained present and also garlanded the PM.
Parmar, a Congress MLA from Borsad assembly who is among the 17 members on the board of the dairy giant, told the daily: “I have been the vice-chairman of Amul for the past 12 years. My father was also the vice-chairman. So many prime ministers have come to Amul, but a political event was never held.”
He added that the saffron party had put up posters of local leaders and party flags at the venue and even the invitation for the event only had names of BJP leaders. “At the function, they ended up patting their own backs. Amul did not gain anything from the event,” the Congress leader said.
Among his reasons for boycotting the function, Parmar said that about Rs 10-15 crore of farmer’s money was spent by the company on the function – which was attended by over one lakh farmers from different areas of Anand, Kheda and Vadodara. Addressing the gathering at the event, the prime minister said:
“In a few years, Amul will complete 75 years. This is a team that is unstoppable. I admire their spirit. Let us think about what targets Amul can set for their own 75th anniversary and for 2022, when India marks 75 years of freedom.”
The new chocolate plant of the Gujarat Cooperative Milk Marketing Federation, the owner of Amul, was built with an investment of Rs 190 crore and will produce 1,000 tonnes of chocolates every month against the capacity of 600 tonnes of the existing plant.
(With PTI inputs)