Be ready to face Lok Sabha elections any time: Advani

New Delhi, Dec 4 (UNI) Leader of the Opposition L K Advani today asked his party MPs to be ready to face elections any time from now onwards as the ruling coalition would not be able to hold on together for long.

Presiding over the BJP Parliamentary Party meeting, Mr Advani commended the party MPs for doing a good job in Parliament raising the issues effectively putting the ruling coalition on the mat.

Touching upon the Gujarat Assembly elections, he said development of the state was the issue on which the party was approaching the people for mandate and was confident it would win the polls, BJP Parliamentary Party spokesman Vijay Kumar Malhotra told newspersons after the meeting.

He said the MPs resolved to lend their support to the farmers demand for seeking Minimum Support price of Rs 1000 per quintal paddy on the lines extended to wheat procurement. The BJP had articulated its support in the interest of providing fair returns to the farmers like the government had done to wheat growers.

Paddy is grown in eleven states and rice consumed in many non-paddy growing states. If the farmers were to switch over to some other commercial crops, it would jeopardise the food security of the nation and no amount of import substitution would help to save the situation, Mr Malhotra said.

The MPs also took exception to the UPA Government naming all the new institutions and projects after members of the Jawaharlal Nehru family -- Rajiv and Indira Gandhi and none after heroes who had dedicated their body mind and souls in service of the nation and freedom struggle, he said.

This had happened systematically during the UPA regime and the party would protest this ''disrespect and disservice'' to the contributions of large numbers of nationalists and freedom fighters, he said.

UNI