Farmers Movement Archive

Vij: Why did SAD not resign earlier?

Chandigarh: Questioning the stance of Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) on the agriculture bills over which the farmers have been protesting in the region, Haryana home minister Anil Vij on Saturday asked why they (Harsimart Kaur) had not resigned when the bill was released and discussed for the first time. Vij was reacting to a recent statement made by SAD chief Sukhbir Badal who reacting to Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s tweet that the bills would not end MSP, had said PM’s tweet is not assurance, they should have mentioned about MSP in the bills. “Badals have their own politics but they should explain as to why they had not resigned the day when this legislation was introduced for the first time. Now, they are making statements on this when it was presented in Parliament knowing well there are no changes in the Bill,” Vij has said. The senior BJP functionary made this statement on Saturday in his daily briefings sent to the media. Vij also targeted Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal and former Haryana CM Bhupinder Singh Hooda for their stand on the agriculture bills. The opposition leader as well as those belonging to the incumbent BJP had criticised the police cane-charge on farmers, who were protesting on September 10 at Pipli near Kurukshetra against the bills, Vij has been maintaining that there was no use of force. In his formal statement, issued on Friday, Vij had even rejected the demand of JJP, which is part of BJP-JJP coalition government in Haryana, regarding the probe into the incident. “When there was no lathicharge, what was the point of any probe? Why would we order for lathi-charge against farmers? There were clear orders from the state government that there should not be lathi-charge on farmers and nothing of that sort had happened,” Vij had said in his statement released on Friday.

The Times of India

2020-09-20

Chandigarh