Farmers Movement Archive

‘Agriculture laws unconstitutional, only meant to benefit corporates’

BATHINDA: Punjab’s protesting farm organisations have reiterated that three new laws are unconstitutional as agriculture is a state subject and central government should not have enacted them. Farm organisations said it had become clear that agri laws were only for benefiting corporates, but not farmers. They asked the central government what was the harm in repealing the laws if the government was for the welfare of farmers as farmers of the country wanted these to be withdrawn and it seemed these were not being repealed to benefit corporates. They said there was no meaning of talks on the draft sent by government on Wednesday, but farmers were ready for talks if the government was ready to roll back the laws. They also claimed that if the government could take back laws like TADA, then it could also roll back the agri laws. In the meanwhile, Union agriculture minister Narendra Singh Tomar and commerce minister Piyush Goyal reiterated that the laws were for the benefit of farmers and the government was open to discussing any issue within them. The farm groups also rejected the benefits of laws listed by the ministers in a press conference on Thursday. They claimed that farm groups had already rejected those. Farmers said as the ultimatum given by farm organisations on relaxation for running passenger and freight trains in Punjab was expiring on Thursday, it had been decided that protests at railway parks or nearby would continue and matter will be decided with farm organisations of the country. They said they would block tracks at other places as well if the need arose. The farm organisations said if some toll plazas were still open in Punjab, these would be closed for toll fee on December 12. BKU Rajewal president Balbir Singh Rajewal said that government was not clear on the constitutional validity of the laws as different ministers were speaking differently and it had become clear that these laws had been enacted for traders, business community and corporates, but not farmers. “Setting up different mandis is to defunct the APMC Act,” he said. Krantikari Kisan Union president Darshan Pal and BKU Dakonda president Buta Singh Burjgill said there were no divisions among farm groups. The protests will continue and will be intensified as more are planned across the country, but the government is stopping farmers from Uttrakhand from reaching Delhi, he said. In the issue of pictures held by farmers at Tikri border of people facing UAPA cases and other cases, Pal said that this was in context of Human Rights Day and nothing more should be read into it.

The Times of India

2020-12-11

Amritsar