Country would be on fire if farmers read fine print on farm laws: Rahul

Senior Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Thursday (January 28) said “the country would have been on fire if all farmers understood the finer print of the three farm laws”.

Speaking at a function at Kalpetta in his constituency Wayanad in Kerala, Gandhi said: “The truth is that most farmers do not understand the details of the Bill (the three Farm Laws), because if they did, there would be an agitation all across the country. The country would be on fire.”

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On the Republic Day tractor rally that turned violent, Gandhi said that violence was not the solution to any problem. He once again urged the Centre to scrap the contentious laws for the benefit of the country and its large agrarian community.

Thousands of farmers, mainly from Punjab and Haryana, are protesting at places around Delhi for more than two months now.

The Centre has projected the laws as a “major agriculture reform” introduced with an aim to liberate farmers from the clutches of middle men and increase their incomes. However, protesting farmers are scared of the new legislations, which they think will leave them dependent on corporates by weakening the MSP and mandi systems.

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Even after 11 rounds of talks, the government and farmer unions have not been able to reach a consensus. The farmers’ main demand is to repeal the three farm laws while the government says it is willing to suspend the laws for a year and a half.

The three laws are: Farmers’ Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Act, 2020; Essential Commodities (Amendment) Act, 2020; and Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement on Price Assurance and Farm Services Act, 2020.