Amidst the mounting anger in Punjab farmers, the Swaraj Abhiyan — a group formed by ousted leaders of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) — on Sunday declared to fight the case of State’s farmers whose crops were destroyed in the whitefly attack in the courts.
It has claimed that the government cannot shirk its responsibility in the supply of “spurious” pesticides to the cotton growers.
For the same, noted Supreme Court lawyer and Abhiyan's national leader Prashant Bhushan will meet the affected farmers and hold a legal camp at Bathinda on December 27, announced Swaraj Abhiyan leader and national convenor of Jai Kisan Andolan Yogendra Yadav and AAP’s Patiala MP Dharamvira Gandhi.
Jai Kisan Andolan is a Swaraj Abhiyan-led farmers’ movement. “Bhushan will fight this case like innumerable other such cases free of cost,” Yadav said.
After fighting for the cause of country’s drought-affected farmers, Bhushan will fight a case on behalf of the cotton farmers of Punjab and demand damages for massive loss to cotton crops in the state, said Yadav.
Yadav and Dr Gandhi held the alleged anti-farmer policies and widespread corruption in the Government machinery responsible for the whitefly induced destruction of cotton crop in the State this year.
“This is a matter where the government is criminally culpable. Therefore, we have decided to take the matter of farmers’ crop loss to the court, not demand relief and compensation, but the damages which the Government owes,” he said.
“For this purpose, we have called a public hearing of the affected farmers in Bathinda on December 27, which Prashant Bhushan
will attend. Here farmers will be invited and requested to join this petition and to file their cases to be taken to the court demanding damages,” Yadav said.
Along with Swaraj Abhiyan Punjab volunteers, the volunteers of ‘Aam Aadmi Volunteer Front Punjab’ would also reach Bathinda on December 27 and help in the preparation of case on behalf of the affected farmers.
Yadav, who was expelled from AAP along with Bhushan, alleged that this was a case involving criminal culpability of those in power. “We also demand that Agriculture Minister Tota Singh must resign because his continuing in power will
seriously affect the nature of investigation in this case,”
he said.
“This is not a natural disaster but a result of fake and spurious pesticides sold by the connivance of unscrupulous Government officials, politicians and corporates,” Yadav said.
Accompanied by AAP's suspended MP Dr Gandhi, Yadav said that the parliamentarian is also lending support to the cause which they have taken up in Punjab, which is to get justice for the cotton farmers affected by the pest white fly attack.
“Dr Gandhi is an independent, credible voice of fairness and truth. He, as you know, is not a part of Swaraj Abhiyan. He has taken his own independent position on the plight of cotton farmers in Punjab. He raised the issue in the Parliament, he also went and met the affected farmers.
PUNJABIS lOOKING FOR VIABlE AlTERNATIVE
Hitting out at the ruling Akali-BJP government in Punjab, the Swaraj Abhiyan leader Yogendra Yadav on Sunday claimed that there was growing anger among the people of the State against the ruling dispensation and they were now desperately looking for a viable alternative.
“What we have witnessed is growing anger and hatred against the present government. I have been a professional student of politics, and I have never come across a government which is hated so much by its own citizens as this Government is. People are desperately looking for a way out,” said Yadav, a former member of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP).
He said: “Unfortunately, what people get are alternatives that they might be different in names, but not different in substance. They get alternatives which practice same kind of politics, same kind of personality, family-driven politics, same kind of Delhi durbar driven politics. There are no true alternatives available in Punjab.”
‘AAP NO DIFFERENT THAN AKAlIS’
Regarding AAP's claims of having a strong footing in Punjab ahead of 2017 assembly polls, Yadav said: “The important question is what Punjabis need; an alternative which is truly different from the current dispensation, both in terms of its substantive policies and also in terms of the way in which it conducts its politics. In both those ways, I do not see AAP
substantially different from the Akalis.”
“I do not know, for example, what is AAP’s agricultural policy. I do not know if their individualism is different from individualism of Badal (Chief Minister). The one way in which they are different is that durbar of Akali party is in Punjab, their durbar is in Delhi,” he said.
‘REMOVE All COPS NAMED BY PINKI FROM KEY OPERATIONAl POSITIONS’
Taking a serious note of startling revelations made by controversial former Punjab police cop Gurmeet Singh alias Pinky, the Swaraj lehar has demanded removal of all police personnels, named by him, from key operational positions.
It has also demanded establishment of a high-level judicial commission to probe all the incidents mentioned by Pinky.
SlP stated that all “tainted” police officials, who have been charged with human right violations and other crimes, should be immediately removed from operational posts. Along with this, the blatantly political ‘halqa’ system should be abolished and former jurisdiction of police stations is restored.