Farmers Movement Archive

Canadian party condemns India’s three farm laws

The Canadian New Democratic Party (NDP), led by Jagmeet Singh, has passed a resolution condemning India with regard to the ongoing protests against three farm laws enacted last year.In fact, the ‘Resolution for International Solidarity with Indian Farmers’ was given the top priority in its agenda in the section, Redefining Canada’s Place in the World, a reflection of the party’s foreign policy stances.It took top position in the convention’s prioritisation list, ahead of justice and peace in Israel-Palestine. Even as two Canadians remain jailed in China, and Canada’s House of Commons on February 22 passed a resolution that defined Chinese actions in Xinjiang as meeting the threshold to be termed as “genocide”, that issue only appeared at eighth place in the list, while Hong Kong Freedom of Expression came even lower at number 12.The resolution for ‘International Solidarity with Indian Farmers’ was moved by members of the party from Brampton East. While he contested elections in 2019 to the House of Commons from Burnaby South in British Columbia, the town of Brampton, in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA), is Federal NDP leader Jagmeet Singh’s home base.The resolution calls for “the federal government to condemn India’s actions and take a firm stand in standing up for farmers and the human rights abuses being carried out by the Indian government” and demands “international accountability to protect the rights of farmers to peacefully protest without duress”.The resolution was passed with a vote of 88 for and 12 against, with every featured speaker debating it coming out in support. Jagmeet Singh was denied a visa by the Indian government in December 2013. At that time, he was a Member of the Provincial Parliament or MPP in Ontario, making him, perhaps, the first-ever sitting member of a Western legislature to have been barred from traveling to India. Later, in March 2018, he was forced to disavow all “acts of terrorism” even as he came into the eye of storm over his appearance at a 2015 event in San Francisco, during which he spoke at a platform with the backdrop of a large poster of Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale, considered in India the person who birthed the violence of Khalistan movement in the 1980s.Similar resolutions did not figure in the three-day national convention of the ruling Liberal Party which ended on Saturday or that of the principal opposition Conservative Party last month.The three-day NDP convention will conclude on Sunday with a speech from Jagmeet Singh.

Hindustan Times

11-04-2021

World