NEW DELHI: The Narendra Modi government sent a new letter to protesting farmers’ unions on Thursday inviting them to dialogue. Congress leaders, including Rahul gandhi i met the president Ram Nath Kovind and demanded a joint session of Parliament to repeal the three agricultural laws. The BJP replied by challenging the former president of Congress to a debate.
Here are the top 10 developments of the day:
1. The center extended a new invitation to protesting farmers’ unions for talks, but made it clear that it would not be “logical” to include any new demands related to the minimum support price (MSP) on the agenda, saying that it was outside the scope of three new farm laws. In a three-page letter written to 40 farmer leaders, the Deputy Secretary of the Ministry of Agriculture, Vivek Aggarwal, said: “Again I ask that the government has been discussing all the issues with an open heart and with good intentions to end protest, and will continue to do so. Then. Please suggest a date and time (for the next round of talks). ” The previous five rounds of talks between the government and the unions have failed to break the deadlock with farmers insisting on the repeal of the three laws and camping at various border points in Delhi for almost a month. Aggarwal asked the union leaders to provide details on other issues they wanted to discuss. The talks will be held at Vigyan Bhawan in New Delhi at the ministerial level, he said. Regarding MSP, Aggarwal said that the agricultural laws have no connection with the price regime nor will they have any impact on the acquisition of agricultural products at fixed rates.
2. The congressional deputy, Rahul Gandhi, claimed that “there is no democracy in India” and that it exists “only in imagination”. He said this after meeting with President Ram Nath Kovind and demanded a joint session of Parliament to repeal the three new farm laws. He said that anyone who opposes Prime Minister Narendra Modi, be they farmers, workers or even RSS chief Mohan bhagwat, will be dubbed a terrorist. If the prime minister does not repeal the controversial agricultural laws, the country will suffer, he said. “India is now an imaginary democracy,” the congressional leader tweeted after meeting Kovind and said he brought the voice of farmers to the president. Gandhi along with the leader of the opposition in Rajya Sabha Ghulam Nabi Azad and the leader of the Congress in the Lok Sabha Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury met with the president and gave him a memorandum signed by two crore farmers seeking the withdrawal of the three agricultural laws .
3. The BJP was quick to challenge Rahul Gandhi for an open debate on what Congress did for the well-being of farmers when he was in power and what the Modi government has done for them, as it rejected his accusations against the Center for considering them “unfounded and illogical”. . Union minister Prakash Javadekar He accused Congress of ignoring the interests of farmers and keeping them in poverty to ensure cheap grain prices, and claimed that the Modi government empowered them by implementing the Swaminathan Commission report to give them a remunerative price through the MSP. The BJP leader noted that PM Modi will transfer Rs 18,000 crore to nine crore farmers on Friday, bringing to a total of Rs 1.20 lakh crore the amount of money it has directly credited to their bank accounts so far. “This is just the beginning. It will continue for 10 years and the total plan is 7 crore lakh rupees,” he said, noting that all Congress did when it was in power was give up its loans worth 53,000 crore rupees. . This money was not given to farmers but to banks against their loans, he noted. “I challenge Congress and Rahul Gandhi to open debate. I will show how Congress always ignored the interests of farmers and how Modi empowered them. Farmers always demanded a remunerative price for their products, but Congress never did,” he added.
4. In a major outreach to farmers, the BJP has made plans to ensure the participation of more than one crore of them in thousands of places across the country on Friday when Prime Minister Narendra Modi transfers 18,000 crore to nine crore of farmers and interact with a section. from them. The leaders of the BJP, from the Union ministers to their MPs, the MLAs, all the elected representatives in addition to the members of the organization, will travel across the country to attend the program and speak with farmers as well. The event coincides with the anniversary of the birth of former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, which the BJP observes every year as “good governance day” since he came to power in the center in 2014. BJP Secretary General Arun Singh said to the media that the party has made arrangements for the farmers. ‘participation in more than 19,000 venues across the country, and party members will also be present.
5. Farmers waving black flags unearthed part of a helipad in Haryana, Senior Deputy Minister Dushyant Chautalaconstituency, later claiming that his protest had forced him to cancel his visit there. Police, however, said the protest by a small group of farmers took place hours after they were informed that the visit had been canceled. His party said there were no visits planned. The protesters dug a small hole in the temporary helipad, police said. The protesters asked Chautala to choose between power or siding with farmers protesting the Center’s farm laws. Calling the state government “anti-farmer”, they raised slogans against Chautala and unearthed a part of the temporary helipad in Karsandhu village in Uchana.
6. Haryana Senior Deputy Minister Dushyant Chautala said the new central agricultural laws need many amendments and urged protesting farmers to give “concrete suggestions”. Leader of the Jannayak Janta Party (JJP) reiterated that he will submit his resignation on the day he feels he cannot guarantee a minimum price support (MSP) to Haryana farmers. Addressing a press conference here, the deputy minister said: “I think there should be a lot of amendments. On this, we have given a lot of suggestions to the Center before and they also agreed with a lot of suggestions … I think the center is ready for incorporate those amendments, “he added. At another point in the briefing, Chautala said that the center was repeatedly inviting farmers’ unions to dialogue and that it was the responsibility of these teams to give “concrete suggestions” on their demands. He hoped that protesting farmers would resume dialogue with the Center to resolve their concerns about the three new laws.
7. The movement of traffic from Noida to Delhi was disrupted in the afternoon when hundreds of farmers, who support the center’s new agricultural laws, gathered near the Mahamaya overpass here, authorities said. These farmers, belonging to various districts in western Uttar Pradesh, have come to the demonstration at the call of the Kisan Sena farmers union and want to go to Delhi to meet with the Union’s agriculture minister, Narendra Singh Tomar, according to the coordinator of the organization, Thakur Gauri Shankar Singh. . This demonstration in Noida comes even as two major farmers’ unions, the Bharatiya Kisan Union (Bhanu) and the Bharatiya Kisan Union (Lok Shakti), camped out on the city’s border for more than three weeks to demand the repeal of the three new plants. agricultural laws. In addition to them, thousands of farmers, mainly from Punjab and Haryana, have stayed for almost a month at other border points in Delhi, including Singhu and Tikri, to protest against the laws. Dozens of BKU (Bhanu) members have hot on the heels of the Chilla border, while BKU (Lok Shakti) supporters are at Dalit Prerna Sthal.
8. The center should repeal the new farm laws as they make farmers feel insecure about their future, said Congressional Leader Sachin Pilot. The former Chief Deputy Minister of Rajasthan said Congress is working hard to ensure that the organization and the state government deliver on promises made to the people of the state. “The center should stop being stubborn and withdraw the farm laws with immediate effect. Farmers feel insecure about their future. They are very concerned,” Pilot told media in Pali.
9. To extend their support for three new agricultural laws, two farmers’ organizations in Uttar Pradesh met on Thursday with the Union’s agriculture minister, Narendra Singh Tomar, and urged him not to repeal the laws, against which several others Unions have been protesting at various borders in the national capital for almost a month now. Kisan Mazdoor Sangh (KMS) and Kisan Sena (KS) made a representation, which also included a lawsuit to strengthen the dispute resolution system in case of any problem in contract farming. So far, at least 12 farmer groups have extended their support for the laws, the previous ones being from Uttarakhand, Delhi and Uttar Pradesh, among other places. BJP leader and former Union Minister Satya Pal Singh was also present at the meeting with a KMS delegation from Baghpat district. After the meeting, Singh told the media that only Punjab farmers are protesting because commission agents fear they will lose their business if duty-free trade outside the mandi is allowed under the new agricultural laws. While there are 16 million farmers in the country, Punjab with 11 lakh farmers are protesting the laws, he claimed, adding that the reason for this is the loss of business for the commission’s agents. Punjab charges the highest mandi tax of 8.5 percent, while in Uttar Pradesh it is 1.5 percent, he added.
10. The Haryana government transferred Ambala Police Superintendent Rajesh Kalia just two days after a group of farmers allegedly blocked Prime Minister Manohar Lal Khattar’s convoy and threw sticks at him. Kalia was published as Ambala SP more than three months ago. According to an official statement, Kalia will be replaced by Hamid Akhtar, who until now was in charge of the SP (Security), CID. Now, Kalia has been appointed SP (Security) of the CID, he said. On Wednesday, Haryana police had arrested 13 farmers on charges of attempted murder and rioting, a day after protesters against the Center’s agricultural laws allegedly blocked the prime minister’s convoy and threw sticks at him. A group of protesting farmers had shown black flags to Khattar as their convoy passed through the town of Ambala. The CM was in town to address public meetings in support of party candidates for the upcoming civic body elections.
With contributions from the agency
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