Farmers' protest will stop only after farm laws are repealed in Parliament, says Rakesh Tikait

Calling Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s announcement to withdraw the three farm bills as a ‘beginning’, Bharatiya Kisan Union (BKU) leader Rakesh Tikait said the ongoing anti-farm laws protest will be withdrawn only after the contentious legislations are repealed in Parliament. He also stressed that the government should talk to farmers over the issue of minimum support price (MSP) of crops and other matters. The BKU national spokesperson said this on Twitter soon after Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced the Centre’s decision to repeal the three farm laws, which were at the center of the farmers’ protest since 26 November last year. “The protest will not be withdrawn immediately, we will wait for the day when the farm laws are repealed in Parliament. Along with MSP, the government should talk to farmers on other issues too,” Tikait tweeted in Hindi.

आंदोलन तत्काल वापस नहीं होगा, हम उस दिन का इंतजार करेंगे जब कृषि कानूनों को संसद में रद्द किया जाएगा ।

सरकार MSP के साथ-साथ किसानों के दूसरे मुद्दों पर भी बातचीत करें : @RakeshTikaitBKU#FarmersProtest

— Rakesh Tikait (@RakeshTikaitBKU) November 19, 2021

Addressing the nation on the occasion of Guru Nanak Jayanti, the prime minister said the three farm laws were for the benefit of farmers but “we couldn’t convince a section of farmers despite best efforts”. The goal of the three farm laws was to empower farmers, especially small farmers, he said. Meanwhile, the Samyukt Kisan Morcha (SKM), an umbrella body of 40 farm unions, on Friday welcomed Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s announcement to repeal the three farm laws. It also said that the SKM will take note of all developments and will hold its meeting soon and announce further decisions if any. “Samyukt Kisan Morcha welcomes this decision and will wait for the announcement to take effect through due parliamentary procedures,” the SKM said in a statement. “The agitation of farmers is not just against the repeal of the three black laws, but also for a statutory guarantee to remunerative prices for all agricultural produce and for all farmers. This important demand of farmers is still pending,” it said. Terming the withdrawal of the three farm laws “historic”, SKM  leader Hannan Mollah said on Friday that the farmers’ have only achieved half of their objective and they will now press for a law to guarantee minimum support price (MSP). Mollah, the general secretary of All India Kisan Sabha (AIKS), said that he was cautious till the legislations were scrapped in Parliament as the BJP-led government was “not trustworthy”. “It is indeed a historic victory for all of us. However, I am a bit cautious and unwilling to trust this government until and unless these three laws are scrapped on the floor of Parliament,” Mollah told PTI. “There are instances where this government had said that they are withdrawing an ordinance, but nothing moved forward. We don’t trust this government as it has a track record of saying something and doing something exactly opposite,” he added. The Bharatiya Kisan Union’s (BKU) Ugrahan faction also welcomed the prime minister’s announcement to repeal the three contentious farm laws. “It is a good move by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on the occasion of Gurupurab,” Joginder Singh Ugrahan, the leader of BKU’s Ugrahan faction, told PTI. On the prime minister’s appeal to protesting farmers to return to their homes, Ugrahan said, “Farmers’ unions will sit together and decide the future course of action.” BKU (Ugrahan) is the largest among all protesting farmers’ unions and are protesting at the Tikri border. Ugrahan faction of the BKU has a sizeable presence across Punjab. With inputs from PTI