Congress leaders, Akalis spar over ordinances on farm sector

However, SAD leaders said the Congress-led government had already amended the State Agriculture Produce Markets Act (APMC) in 2017 to include all the provisions of the Farming Produce Trade and Commerce Ordinance, 2020, which was passed by the Centre recently.

Chandigarh, Jun 17 (PTI Leaders of the ruling Congress and opposition SAD in Punjab on Wednesday engaged in a war of words over three ordinances related to the agriculture sector. These ordinances are the Farmers' Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Ordinance, Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement on Price Assurance and Farm Services Ordinance, and the Essential Commodities (Amendment) Ordinance.

The recent three ordinances passed by the Centre are completely against farmers and would badly hit the agrarian state of Punjab, five state ministers said in a joint statement. The ministers included Tript Rajinder Singh Bajwa, Sukhjinder Singh Randhawa, Gurpreet Singh Kangar, Sukhbinder Singh Sukh Sarkaria and Balbir Singh Sidhu. They accused the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) of supporting these ordinances, which, they said, was "anti-Punjab". However, SAD leaders said the Congress-led government had already amended the State Agriculture Produce Markets Act (APMC) in 2017 to include all the provisions of the Farming Produce Trade and Commerce Ordinance, 2020, which was passed by the Centre recently. The ministers in their statement said by supporting these ordinances, SAD chief Sukhbir Badal had proved that they "pawned" their ideology before the BJP for saving the chair of Harsimrat Kaur Badal in the Modi cabinet.

The Punjab Congress has planned to launch an agitation against the three ordinances on June 19. SAD leader Daljit Singh Cheema dared Punjab Congress chief Sunil Jakhar to do a 'jan andolan' against Chief Minister Amarinder Singh who had amended the State APMC in 2017.

He asked the Punjab Congress president to also tell why he was trying to "befool" farmers. Former minister Cheema also asked him to explain why he was hiding the fact that the Congress government had amended the State APMC Act to allow creation of private yards, permission for e-trading and permission for direct marketing. "The Congress government is also party to passing of the Farming Produce Ordinance. It participated in the consultative process and also gave feedback to the Centre that it had already amended the state APMC Act to enable implementation of the proposed Ordinance", claimed Cheema.

Cheema said Jakhar should spell out if the amendment of the State APMC Act by his government was right or wrong. "If he feels it was an anti-farmer step he should start his 'jan andolan' from the chief minister's residence in Chandigarh and force the government to take it back", he said. Cheema, however, said the minimum support price and assured marketing are here to stay.

The SAD will ensure this at all costs. "We have already announced that there will not be any compromise on these issues," he said. Chief Minister Amarinder Singh had already appealed to Prime Minister Narendra Modi to reconsider the decision on three ordinances on the farm sector, saying these will lead to "exploitation" of farmers by organised trade and further "exacerbate the socio-economic tensions" among the state's peasantry.

He has also expressed his reservation about the laws that the Centre had said would transform the farm sector and help raise farmers' income..

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)