Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal on Monday said that his Government has sought the Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s intervention in
resolving the agrarian crisis in the State.
“State Government is in touch with the Prime Minister to resolve farm crisis and sought immediate intervention of the Centre to form a high-level committee of farm experts to pull the economy from the current agrarian crisis,” said Badal.
He accused the successive Congress Governments at the Centre of formulating “anti-farmer policies” which “have been forcing” the beleaguered farmers to end their lives.
“Congress-led Governments at the Centre for over six decades have absolutely ignored the hardships faced by the farmers,” he alleged whole speaking at a Sangat Darshan programme in lambi Assembly constituency.
The Chief Minister said that the State Government had hardly any role in fixing the costs of agriculture inputs like diesel, pesticides, fertilisers and even the minimum support price (MSP), which primarily fell within the domain of the Centre.
He said that the State Government had initiated “certain steps to put the derailed agrarian economy back on track by way of giving subsidy to the tune of Rs 5,000 crore annually to PSPCl” in return of free power in the farm sector and enhancing the natural calamity fund from Rs 3,400 to Rs 8,000 per acre.
Badal said that the State Government has started first-of-its-kind scheme to provide interests free crop loans worth Rs 50,000 to the farmers.
“In a ‘historic decision’, it has been decided that all the farmers would be provided a health insurance cover of Rs 50,000 and an insurance of Rs 5 lakh in case of accidental death or incapacitation of head of family,” he said.
Terming the Aam Aadmi Party’s (AAP) ‘Punjab Dialogue’ programme as a “flop show”, Badal said that AAP national convener Arvind Kejriwal was “least concerned” about the rights of the state, which was evident from the fact of submitting an affidavit in the Supreme Court by the Delhi Government regarding the river waters.
“Kejriwal cited the reason of disintegration of country on the stand taken by the Punjab government over SYl issue and termed it as unconstitutional in the affidavit filed in the Apex Court,” Badal alleged.
He said that Kejriwal belonged to Haryana and his “infatuation and affection” with his state was all the more natural.
Badal also noted that the people of Punjab were well aware about Kejriwal’s stand and they have turned back to his
program ‘Punjab Dialogue’, which was now gradually losing its sheen.