Farmers Movement Archive

Not negotiating for any post with anyone, says Sidhu

Former Punjab cabinet minister and cricketer Navjot Singh Sidhu on Sunday said that he was not negotiating for any post with anyone. Sidhu’s statement comes amid conjecture that he may leave the Congress, as his talks with chief minister Capt Amarinder Singh for a return to the cabinet have remained inconclusive. “My opponents have been spreading lies that I am negotiating for returning to the state cabinet. I have never negotiated with anyone for any post in any party. Even my son left the post of assistant advocate general and my wife didn’t accept the chairmanship of a board, even as these were offered to them. I am into politics for Punjab and not for personal gains,” Sidhu told reporters on the sidelines of a press conference he held on the direct system of payment of farmers. Sidhu had quit the cabinet in June 2019 after a change in portfolio from local government to power. Since then, the Congress high command has been working for his return to the government and the party hierarchy. Efforts of successive All-India Congress Committee (AICC) general secretaries have not yielded result. Sidhu has not joined any party poll campaign since leaving the cabinet, even after being named a star campaigner. On March 18 this year, he had met the CM at his residence, where Amarinder said he had asked Sidhu to join the cabinet. Dodging questions on the functioning of the CM and the state government’s performance, Sidhu said “It’s not you or me, who have to judge the policies and the functioning of the Punjab government. It is the public, which has to pass the final judgement. The government will regain power, if its policies are good.” ‘CENTRE BLACKMAILING PUNJAB’ On Centre’s mandate of making direct payment to farmers for their produce, Sidhu claimed that the BJP was trying to divide Punjab’s farmers and the timing of the directive raised eyebrows. “Union minister Piyush Goyal is patently wrong when he says that the Punjab revenue department has complete information about land record of farmers in the state,” he said, adding that as per data collected by National Sample Survey for 2012-13, more than 24% (almost one-fourth) of land under cultivation in the state is under tenancy. These tenancy contracts are oral/unwritten in nature. “It is, therefore, not practical to implement direct payment in Punjab. If today, the sale of wheat crop is allowed only with ownership rights, over 24% of growers in the state will not receive payment,” he claimed, adding, “This amounts to economic blackmail by the Centre to force farmers and the Punjab government to withdraw their agitation against the three farm laws.”

Hindustan Times

04-04-2021

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