New Delhi: The Congress party has extended its support to the 'Bharat Bandh' call given by the farmer organisations who are protesting against the contentious farm bills. Standing in solidarity with the annadata (farmers), the opposition party stated that they will continue to protest until the government fulfills their demand.
Speaking to ETV Bharat, Congress spokesperson Supriya Shrinate said, "It's an absolutely legitimate protest. What is rightfully theirs, is being denied by this Government. With these bills, Centre will get the opportunity to exploit farmers and hence they have removed the protection that Indian farmers have had all these years. We stand with the farmers and we are against these bills."
Congress party has alleged that the farm bills have various provisions which would leave the Indian Farmers at the mercy of corporate players.
"If you are not going to specify provisions in the law that there has to be a MSP, what stops the farmers from being exploited? Average landholding of an Indian farmer is under 2 acres. Do you think such farmers have negotiating powers with big facets of Indian industry?" Supriya Shrinate said.
Opposition parties had opposed the passage of three bills including Farmers' and Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Bill, 2020, and Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement on Price Assurance and Farm Services Bill, 2020, and the Essential Commodities (Amendment) Bill, 2020, in Parliament. However, these bills got the clearance despite strong opposition in Rajya Sabha.
The party has also raised concern about no provision in these bills over dispute resolution, mentioning that farmers would not be able to negotiate before the corporates.
READ: Farm bills are "anti-farmer" and "anti-worker": Yogendra Yadav
Shrinate stated, "You've given them 30 days of time to appeal in case of a dispute and you've given 60 days for the corporates. How lopsided is that? The highest court of appeal is SDM. However, it is difficult to even pass through the lekhpal and patwari in different parts of the country. So, do you really think he would be able to realistically approach SDM?"
She further added, "There are provisions in these bills which are absolutely against farmers and favours the rich industrialists of this country. But I'm not surprised because these are the true colours of this Government, which they are showing blatantly now."
Replying to a question on the demands of Congress party from the Central Government, she said, "These bills need to go. Anything that is against the grains and rights of Indian farmers will have to go. If the Government is really serious about reforming agriculture, they should have many more small markets that should be accessed by farmers likely we've said in our manifesto."
She mentioned that the Center has removed the provision of mandis and not even fixed MSP for the crops, due to which farmers will be exploited while selling their produce. "Until the changes in will be made, Congress will continue to defy what the Government has done," she said.
While on the other side, BJP-led Central Government is alleging that Congress party is 'misleading' the farmers of this country. Recently, Union Agriculture Minister Narendra Singh Tomar had said that MSP was always an administrative decision of the Government and would remain so.
He added, "Congress was misleading farmers and practising double-faced politics."
Supriya, while replying to the allegations, said, "They all say that the PM has mentioned there will be MSP. But PM had also said there will be 15 lakhs in our accounts, there will be 2 crore jobs created every year, we'll win the war against Corona in 21 days, demonetization will give a huge spike in our GDP, though it has halved the GDP. The highest rate of unemployment is under PM Modi's regime. He has failed in every parameter. What promise he has lived up to?"
She also asserted, "Can we leave the Indian farmers to the false promises of the Prime Minister? It's an absolute betrayal of the promises and we'll not accept this."
Earlier today, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi also backed the farmers' protest, while tweeting, "A flawed GST destroyed MSMEs. The new agriculture laws will enslave our farmers. #ISupportBharatBandh".
