Sacked BSF jawan says he will contest LS polls against PM Modi from Varanasi

Ex-BSF jawan Tej Bahadur Yadav, who was sacked from service after he uploaded a video complaining of bad quality food being served to the forces, on Friday said he will contest the upcoming Lok Sabha elections from Varanasi constituency in Uttar Pradesh against Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

Yadav, a resident of Rewari in Haryana, claimed he was approached by several parties to join them but chose to contest as an independent candidate. He said by contesting the elections he would raise the issue of corruption in the forces.

“My motive is not to win or lose. It is to highlight how this government has failed the forces, especially paramilitary forces. PM Modi seeks votes in the name of our jawans but has done nothing for them. Our paramilitary jawans (CRPF men) killed recently in Pulwama were not even given martyr status by this government,” he said.

Yadav was dismissed from BSF in 2017 after he took to the social media to complain about the quality of food being served to the forces in Jammu and Kashmir.

He has challenged his dismissal in the court and the case is in the trial stage. “My dismissal was completely wrong. They claimed I am being removed for indiscipline.

At least the government could have bothered to address the corruption issue I had raised. Its actions to suppress my voice only shows this government is a party to large scale corruption in the forces,” Yadav said.

He said he would soon go to Varanasi and start campaigning with the help of ex-servicemen and farmers. “We are building our strategy to target maximum voters,” he said.

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First Published: Mar 30, 2019 08:34 IST