Senior BJP leader M. Venkaiah Naidu hinted on Saturday that if the NDA was voted to power in the next general election, it would seriously consider amending the Constitution to include the "right to food" as a fundamental right of every citizen. The occasion was the launch of the state government's "Mukhya Mantri Annapurna Yojana" under which families holding BPL ration cards would be given wheat and rice at Rs 3 and Rs 4.50 per kg, respectively. Things are moving in that direction, he told reporters in the state capital. Food security, in fact, would be the focus of the party's poll campaign of which he has been given the charge in Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan. Victory in all three states would give the party the required push to winning the Lok Sabha poll in 2009. Mr Naidu, said the shortsighted policies of the UPA regime were solely responsible for the current food crisis. Surely this wasn't expected from a regime whose Prime Minister, finance minister, and Planning Commission vicechairman were economists. The experience only proved that bookish knowledge and expertise was no substitute for native intelligence and common sense. While the country's population was rising 1.8 per cent annually, food supplies were lagging behind at 0.8 per cent. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, said Mr Naidu, had appealed to parties not to "politicise" the food crisis forgetting that the Congress and its allies had coursed to power in 2004 on the drumbeat of rising onion prices. The PM, they say, is an "honest" man. But would an honest man exhibit an open bias in the disbursement of basics like grain, coal and power to Opposition ruled states? Gujarat CM Narendra Modi, who launched the same scheme separately in Indore in the presence of chief minister Shivraj Singh Chauhan said the MP government's initiative would serve as a model for other states. In fact, his own government would replicate some of its measures. Rising food prices, he argued, had swept aside the Congress' traditional poll plank: poverty and its alleviation. Mr Modi also heaped generous praise on his counterpart for smashing the Simi network. "They are anti-nationals, and should get the treatment they deserve."