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Upbeat over their ‘victory’ following the announcement by Prime Minister Narendra Modi to roll back the three contentious farm laws, the Bhartiya Kisan Union declared at a Kisan Mahapanchayat in Lucknow on Monday that their agitation would continue till six demands, including legal guarantee, were not accepted by the government.
The Mahapanchayat was organised by Samyukta Kisan Morcha (SKM), an umbrella body of the agitating farmer unions, on the MSP issue. The SKM has been spearheading the farmers' agitation against the three farm laws and blocked the Delhi-Haryana border for the last one year.
Addressing the Kisan Mahapanchayat at Eco Garden in Lucknow, Bhartiya Kisan Union leader Rakesh Tikait hit out at the Union government, accusing it of trying to divide the farmers and said that it should talk to them to resolve their issues or else they would not go away. The farmer leader also said that Prime Minister Narendra Modi should give a clear answer on the demand for a law guaranteeing Minimum Support Price (MSP) that he had supported while being the Chief Minister of Gujarat in 2011.
“We welcome the Prime Minister for his announcement for the repeal of the three Farm laws. The PM made this announcement with a touch of sarcasm and tried to drive a wedge among the farmers’ and he should give a clear answer on the demand for a law guaranteeing Minimum Support Price (MSP). It took one year for us to make them understand. We said our things in our own language but those sitting in shining bungalows in Delhi had another language”.
“The Modi government took one year to understand that these laws are harmful and decided to repeal the three laws. The government did the right thing by withdrawing the laws but tried to divide farmers by saying that they failed to make some people understand the laws. We are some people,” Tikait said, referring to the Prime Minister’s apology while announcing the decision to withdraw the three central Farm laws on Friday.
Tikait said that a ‘sangharsh-vishram’ (ceasefire) has been declared by the Central government and not farmers and that there are many issues before the peasants. “The farmers' struggle will continue. The government should talk to farmers about the issues related to them or else we are not going to go away. Meetings will be held all over the country and we will tell the people about your work,” he said. Talks between the government and the agitating unions over the three farm laws were stalled in January after nearly a dozen rounds of discussions failed to break the deadlock.
Urging people to join the farmers’ movement, Tikait said, “They will entangle you all in Hindu-Muslim, Hindu-Sikh and Jinnah. Farmers will not get the right rate of their produce by apology but by framing a policy."
As the chief minister of Gujarat, Narendra Modi was part of a committee that had suggested to the then Prime Minister Manmohan Singh that a law guaranteeing MSP was required. The report of this committee is lying with the Prime Minister’s Office. There is no new committee required nor the country has more time. The Prime Minister will have to give a clear answer before the country whether he will accept the suggestion of the committee he was a part of for MSP guarantee law.”
Tikait also attacked the media saying that since the past three days they have only been questioning the farmers. Among the demands made by SKM are withdrawal of cases against farmers, building a memorial for protesters who lost their lives during the agitation and withdrawal of the Electricity Amendment Bill.