Farmers Movement Archive

Farmers’ protest: SC notices to Centre, Delhi on pleas seeking reopening of borders

The Supreme Court on Wednesday issued notice on petitions demanding reopening of Delhi’s borders blocked by farmers agitating against the three farm laws passed by Parliament.A three-judge bench headed by Chief Justice of India (CJI) SA Bobde called the issue “important” And issued notice to Centre and Delhi government. The court allowed the petitioners to include the farmer organisations which are striking to also be included as parties in the petition while posting the matter for hearing tomorrow.Solicitor General Tushar Mehta informed the court that the Bharatiya Kisan Union (BKU) is one of the organisations spearheading thr agitation. At the same time, he pointed out, “Other interests have also taken over this farmer protests.” Highlighting the steps the government was taking to negotiate with farmer groups, he said, there was no headway as farmers were not willing to sit across the table with the Union ministers. “The government is and was willing to engage in talks and discuss clause by clause but the organisations’ approach is, ‘will you repeal or not repeal’.”The bench said, “This will soon become a national issue. It doesn’t seem the government sitting with farmers will resolve the issue. We will form a committee to resolve the issue. It will have members from BKU, the Union Government and some farmer bodies from rest of India.”Mehta was open to this suggestion. While Delhi government represented by advocate Rahul Mehra submitted that the issue of farmers must be immediately resolved, the bench remarked, “Delhi has nothing to do with resolution of dispute. It’s between Centre and farmers.”The court also allowed the petitioners, Rishab Sharma, Reepak Kansal and GS Mani, to contact the solicitor general’s office and get the names of the farmer organisations blocking the road. The court noted, “We must have farmers before us to enable negotiation,” allowing the petitioners to join them as parties to their petitions. The court told Mehta, “These petitions appear to be ill-conceived. We don’t see any legal issue involved except right to free movement of citizens being affected under Article 19(1) (g). Only person which is at the spot is the Union which has blocked the farmers from entering the Capital.” The court asked him to prepare a framework of this committee and members to be included from the governmentThroughout the hearing, Mehta got messages from senior advocate Harish Salve who wished to address the court but was not allowed into the videoconferencing facility. His petition was not before the court. The court directed Salve’s petition to also be listed tomorrow.

Hindustan Times

16-12-2020

India