As talks between the Center and farmers’ unions opposing the new farm laws failed to make progress, and the Supreme Court was scheduled to hear a series of petitions related to the matter on Monday, the Punjab government said on Saturday that petitions to challenge the newly enacted laws had finalized.
Also on Saturday, the Consortium of Indian Farmers Associations (CIFA) approached the Supreme Court, seeking to be heard against challenging the new laws. He said that “agricultural reforms are beneficial to allow an increase in farmers’ income and growth in agriculture.”
Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh said that the state’s attorney general, Atul Nanda, had already prepared and finalized petitions to challenge the three core laws.
“As these laws impact the lives and futures of our farmers, all decisions will be made with care and prudence in a timely manner,” the Chief Minister said in a statement.
He said that although matters relating to agriculture are mentioned in List II (State List) of the Constitution of India and fall under the exclusive domain of the state government, the Government of India had promulgated all three agricultural laws under the provisions related to agricultural commercialization mentioned in List III (Concurrent List).
Being a core legislation, the state government, he said, had limited options under article 254 (2) of the Constitution and had exercised it with the approval of the Punjab assembly of bills to amend the core laws. According to the law of the land, any bill approved by the state assembly, he said, must be sent to the governor, who, after studying it, must grant consent to send it to the president for approval.
Amarinder Singh said the state government was following established procedure and would take corrective legal action after exhausting other options.
He attacked the AAP and other opposition leaders and asked them to desist from the “lies”. “Unlike you, I do not see the current crisis facing our farmers as an opportunity to advance any political agenda. It is about the future and the lives of our farmers and I am fully committed to protecting them, ”he said.
Addressing the AAP state chairman Bhagwant Mann, the chief minister accused him of “telling outright lies” and “making illogical statements with the sole motive of misleading the people.”
He said his government’s position on the Center’s agricultural laws had been consistent, while the AAP and SAD had been “playing flip-flops” about it.
“One day you unanimously support our bills and the leaders of your party, including the leader of the opposition, Harpal Singh Cheema, you accompany me to the governor, and the next day you somersault and begin to oppose them,” he said.
He said that the “double face of the AAP and its collusion with the BJP to weaken farmers’ agitation had been further exposed when Arvind Kejriwal meekly notified one of the agricultural laws in Delhi rather than following Punjab’s lead of introducing legislation in the assembly to nullify the impact. ” of the black agricultural laws ”.
Meanwhile, the Consortium of Indian Farmers Associations (CIFA) approached the Supreme Court, seeking to be heard in challenging the agricultural laws.
In a letter addressed to the Chief Justice of India SA Bobde and judges AS Bopanna and V Ramasubramanian – this is the court that hears the challenge to laws and petitions against farmers’ protests – CIFA chief adviser P Chengal Reddy, requested instructions from the Government of India “to consult with other farmers’ associations in other parts of the country before modifying any provision of the laws.”
Welcoming the new laws, the CIFA said that since liberalization, services and industry had grown by 10 percent, while the agricultural sector had remained stagnant at 2 percent. “It is due to denial of access to modern technologies, lack of investment and restricted markets,” said CIFA, adding that the late farmer leader Sharad Joshi and the “National Farmers Commission (MS Swaminathan Committee report) they recommended reforms that include the elimination of restrictions on movement, storage, export processing “and” also modify the laws of leasing and allow farming by contract.
The CIFA said that “farmers producing 321 million tons of fruits and vegetables (2019), 26 MT of legumes, 33 MT of oilseeds, 9 MT of cotton millet, 6.42 MT of spices” and 282 lakh ton of sugar “They are suffering due to the inability to obtain profitable returns.”
“We have no procurement facilities. The main problems are the enormous waste due to the lack of storage, processing and export. The quality is also low due to the lack of extension services. Productivity is very low due (to) the non-adoption of technologies and agriculture dependent on rain, ”said CIFA.
He said the reforms at APMC will help a farmer “send his product directly to the processing industries, to exporters and to the super bazaar. It allows farmers to (have) a long-term memorandum of understanding with the markets, in which farmers will get quality inputs, extension services, credit, and crop insurance. It will allow… price by mutual agreement. The long-term availability of standardized products will help to plan the long-term market strategy ”.
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