Mathura: Under the centre's ambitious Sansad Adarsh Gram Yojana (SAGY), actor-turned-politician Hema Malini had adopted Rawal village in Uttar Pradesh's Mathura. In 2014, the BJP MP had made tall promises of turning the village into a modern one.
Four years into the adoption of the village and another round of Lok Sabha polls just around the corner, ETV Bharat visited the village to see if the 'Dreamgirl' has, at all, succeeded in turning Rawal into an 'Adarsh' (ideal) village as assured by her.
With a population of around 3,000, Rawal is located barely 15 kilometres from Baldev assembly constituency.
While some of the villagers were satisfied with the development work done so far by the veteran actor, some did not hesitate to express their dissatisfaction.
When asked if Hema Malini had delivered on her promises, an elderly woman from Rawal are more or less satisfied with the development, she has set up an RO plant in the village, a community hall, constructed roads and a hospital as well. She keeps visiting the village in every two months."
However, the woman did not appear happy when it came to Malini's promises of building housing facilities or awarding plots of land as promised by her.
She said, "Although she (Hema Malini) said that she would build us pucca houses, award plots of lands to landless villagers and construct toilets, she hasn't delivered on those promises yet. There are barely 25-30 toilets constructed so far."
Speaking to ETV Bharat, another village elderly said, "The way Hema Malini has worked towards the development of the village, no other MP or MLA has worked this hard. We now even have access to electricity."
The primary objective of SAGY was to have Members of Parliament oversee the development of their adopted village and cater to the needs of the inhabitants based within that particular adopted village. Some of the basic goals to be achieved under the ambitious scheme include educational facilities, health, cleanliness, skill development, livelihood, electricity, pucca houses, etc.
Hema Malini had fought her maiden election from Mathura saying that she has a "divine connection" with the city of Lord Krishna in 2014. She defeated RLD's sitting MP Jayant Chaudhary in 2014 by a huge margin of 3,30,743 votes in 2014.
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This year, she is pitted against RLD's Kunwar Narendra Singh.
Voting will be held in Mathura in the second round of seven-phase Lok Sabha polls on April 18 and results will be announced on May 23.
