Farmers’ protest enters 30th day; Rahul Gandhi-led Congress delegation to meet President, submit 2 crore signatures against farm laws

NEW DELHI: The ongoing farmers’ protest against the Centre’s three contentious farm laws entered its 30th day on Thursday. Farmers unions protesting against three farm laws that aim to liberalise the agricultural economy said on Wednesday that they will not restart negotiations until the Centre draws up a new agenda, presenting an increasingly difficult challenge to a Union government trying to find a way to end a month-long agitation on the Capital’s borders.

After a large meeting of nearly 100 farm leaders, the protesters also reiterated that they would remain at the protest sites, where thousands have gathered over for nearly a month, until their demand — a repeal of the laws — was met.

On behalf of the government, Union Agriculture Minister Narendra Singh Tomar said on Wednesday that the Centre will continue with reforms in the farm sector as they are still due in many areas, even as he reiterated his hope that protesting farmers will soon come forward to resume their dialogue with the Centre to resolve their concerns over three new laws.

The minister said any agitation can be resolved only through dialogue as has been the case always in history and urged the protesting unions to fix a date and time for the next round of talks.

Protesting farmer unions, who have stuck to their demand for a complete repeal of all three agri-laws, have not yet conveyed their decision on the central government's offer for fresh talks. Thousands of farmers have been camping on various borders of the national capital for almost four weeks now. The government has already sent a draft proposal to unions offering at least seven amendments to the three legislations that were enacted in September.

"I am fully hopeful that our farmer unions will discuss... If they give a date and time, the government is ready for the next round of talks... I am hopeful that we will move towards resolving the issue," Tomar told reporters.

Tomar said the government is hopeful that unions will soon discuss, decide and communicate their decision, after which the government can hold the next round of discussions immediately.

Meanwhile, a delegation of Congress leaders, led by former party chief Rahul Gandhi, will meet President Ram Nath Kovind on Thursday to submit around 20 million signatures collected from across the country in the past three months seeking repeal of the three farm laws.

Congress general secretary in-charge of organisation KC Venugopal said in a statement that the party had launched a nationwide campaign in September for collecting memoranda of appeals addressed to the President signed by farmers, farm labourers and other stakeholders opposing the three new farm legislations.

He said around 20 million signatures seeking the President’s intervention for withdrawal of these laws had been collected till now.

“The government has chosen to brazenly defame, discredit and eventually tire out the lakhs of protesting farmers. The Narendra Modi government and its ministers have chosen to insult them,” he alleged.

The Congress had launched its three-month-long “mass movement” against the government for enacting the Farmer’s Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Bill, 2020, the Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement of Price Assurance and Farm Services Bill, 2020 and the Essential Commodities (Amendment) Bill, 2020.

At least five rounds of formal talks with the protesting unions have failed to break the deadlock, but a number of other farm groups have been meeting the government in the meantime to extend their support to the new laws.

While the government has presented the three laws as major reforms, protesting farmers fear they would weaken the mandi and MSP systems and leave them at the mercy of big corporates. However, the government has maintained these apprehensions are misplaced and has accused opposition parties of misleading the farmers.