Congress to launch statewide '100 not out Campaign' to protest against fuel price hike

Karnataka: Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee President DK Shivakumar on Wednesday announced that party will launch '100 not out Campaign' on June 11 to hold statewide protests against steep hike in Petrol prices.

"KPCC is organizing a five-day long '100 not out Campaign' campaign from 11th June to 15th June where protests will be held at five thousand major petrol pumps of the State. On 11th, protests will be in all the District Head Quarters, 12th at all the Taluk Headquarters, 13th on Hobli Headquarters, 14th in all Gram Panchayats and 15th in all other major portions of the State," Shivakumar said addressing a press conference at KPCC headquarters in Bengaluru.

"The party leaders will be supervising the protests through Zoom calls. Also all Congress leaders will be making one-minute videos sharing their views against the fuel price-hike and will share them to our IT Cell," Shivakumar said insisting the protests will be organized very cautiously following all the Covid protocols.

"This government has stooped down to pick-pocketing at the name of excise and taxes on petrol. So, we are launching this extensive protest campaign," he said pointing BJP is determined to make petrol unaffordable for common man.

"This government has been ridiculing the Covid protocols. They had no problem with Modi holding big rallies, they had no issue when they did extensive election campaign for three months and there was no problem when Kumba Mela happened. So they should not have any problem with Congress holding protests from 11 am to 12 noon for five days," Shivakumar said taking pot-shots at the BJP.

"But Congress party understands the gravity of situation. We do not want to spread Covid. SO we will wear masks, maintain social distancing while organizing protests," Shivakumar said.

The BJP government has hiked fuel prices 48 times in this year. The union government increased petrol prices 10 times in January, 16 times in February, 16 times in May and six times in first nine days of June. They did not increase prices in month of March and April as elections were held for five states in these two months. In last seven years Modi government has earned more than Rs 21.60 lakh crore through taxes, excise duties and surcharges on petroleum products.