FARMERS VS THE MODI GOVERNMENT

What do these laws say?

“No civil court shall have jurisdiction to entertain any suit or proceedings in respect of any matter, the cognizance of which can be taken and disposed of by any authority empowered by or under this act or rules made thereunder.”

-Section 15 of these laws

“No civil court shall have jurisdiction to entertain any suit or proceedings in respect of any dispute which a sub -divisional authority or the appellate authority is empowered by or under this act to decide and no injunction shall be granted by any court or authority in respect of any action taken or to be taken in pursuance of any power conferred by or under this act or any rules made thereunder.”

-section 19

“No suit, prosecution or other legal proceedings shall lie against the central government or the state government or any other person in respect of anything which is in good faith done or intended to be done under this act or orders made thereunder.”

-section 13 of The Farmers’ Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Act, 2020

It clearly says that ‘no person’ i.e. not only the farmers but the common people too have no right to seek jurisdiction or demand legal help, if disagreeing with these laws and no legal remedy will be given to them thereby.

You are also not allowed to file Public Interest Litigation (PIL) in any case.

This not only ends here; government officials or any other person who did anything against the people for ‘good faith’ (which only means to be in favor of these laws) under these laws won’t be punishable and no legal proceedings would lie against him.

Thereby, giving free power to you IF you are a praiser of these laws.

Whereas,

Article 19 of our Indian constitution talks about freedom of speech and expression.

Article 32 talks about Right to constitutional remedies i.e. a person can go to the Supreme Court for the enforcement of our rights and article 226 for the High court.

These fundamental rights can only be suspended during emergency by the president under article 359.

Now why are we not allowed to perform and demand our basic rights too?

Need for these laws

Why did the BJP government feel that the height of pandemic was a good time to push through these laws when a thousand other things are demanding more urgent attention?

All the reform bills whether ensuring double income by 2022, contract farming or others are only enforced due to POLITICAL INTEREST.

In the peak time of elections, what the government does is increase the MSP or provide loans at low rates of interest just to fill their VOTE BANKS.

Farmers FEARS

Why are farmers not agreeing for the repeal of these laws when they know that its suspension will take them back to the old agrarian crisis?

It is because they know and understand the trap behind this and that these laws would not only affect agriculture but it will also snatch our rights from our hands.

Bihar and east UP have already implemented new laws. Now what

They are getting 800/900 rupees for wheat (MSP- 1800) and the same is for the other crops. Farmers there are working as laborers outside to feed themselves and their families. Why is there no benefit from NEW LAWS?

86% of farmers are small farmers i.e. farmers who own less than 2 hectares of land each. They fear they do not have enough bargaining power (as the businessman and the farmer are put on the same pedestrian) to get the price they wish.

“The government has left us at the mercy of big corporations.”

-says a farmer

Farmers have been continuously and repeatedly raising their voices highlighting what these big corporations will mean to us, but no media talks or shows about this.

The new laws also do not make written contracts mandatory. So in case of any violation of their rights, it can be very difficult for a farmer to prove his point.

Framers also fear these large corporations because they have seen the tremendous shoot up in the prices of fertilizers and seeds over the years.

MSP (Minimum Support Price) has not been abolished but either it is not guaranteed too. Earlier, MSP was given for certain crops and farmers fear that now that too will vanish.

If there is one committee report that all the farmers understood and agreed to implement is the ‘SwamiNathan Report’ which the congress and BJP have buried that report while promising to act on it.

In November 2018 itself, over a lakh of farmers gathered near parliament in Delhi demanding for the implementation of this report. And they were from 22 states and 4 union territories, not only Punjab.

The report ensures a debt waiver, guaranteed MSP and many other demands including a special session of parliament to discuss agrarian issues. You can see what is more relevant and accurate in the eyes of farmers and everyone standing with them.

Analyzing through data

If the government’s minimum support price programme helped in properly creating a minimum floor price, farmers across 11 major agricultural states would have earned almost Rs1,900 crore more by selling their produce.

Due to dales below the MSP farmers suffered notional losses to the tune of Rs333 crore.

75 % of paddy growers and over 65% of wheat growers didn’t even know about the government agencies and live on mercy of intermediaries.

And 68% of paddy growers and 60% of wheat growers haven’t even heard of MSP.

Among them only the rich farmers were able to take the benefit of this and as we know 86% of the farmers are poor and marginal farmers and 14% account for rich farmers.

One of the key demands of the ongoing farmers’ agitation is that MSP should be made a legal right. What they fear is that the announcement of MSP for most of the crops remains only on papers.

January 26th, 2021 incident

Hoisting of Sikh Flag (Nishan Sahib) at Red fort attracted a large number of so called nationalists who were on the hibernating mode from past 3 months and suddenly woke their patriotism for the country.

We heard that the National flag of our country was also harmed and abused while none of us had been the eye witness on the ground level and knew the REAL facts about that.

On the other hand, the pre-planned route of the march was miss guided and changed by the police. Red Fort on that very special day seemed to be more of a mortuary. Just think for once out of the topic what was the police’s actual motive.

Tear gas bombs, water cannons, barricades, lathis was all which the police gave in return for this march and still they expected the protestors to be silent.

Also, what actually needed more concern was to find the faces who completely changed the direction of this peaceful protest and marked it as a RIOT.

What is BJP doing?

Demonetization, GST, CAA, NRC and many more.

GDP has been at its lowest value this year and Modi ji sees a ‘good faith’ in this.

Claiming the false promises of ‘ache din’, providing two crore jobs, increasing crop prices and smart cities are some of the false promises made by him.

‘These billionaires have usurped Rs8 lakh Crores until now, of which the government has waived off Rs1.14 lakh crores.’

-Said Delhi’s CM on November 2018

‘NDA wrote off 8 lakh crore bad loans, reveals RTI. ’

On December 2020

NITI AAYOG CEO, Amitabh Kant said at an online event that it is difficult to carry out tough reforms in India as ‘we are too much of Democracy.’ And yes we can see this TOO MUCH.

KHALISTANIS, URBAN NAXALS, TERRORISTS

Calling them by these names is what all the media and bhakts are doing. You should go and see where all the protestors have been coming and are daily increasing.

And let me mention this, if we (Sikhs) in actual want KHALISTAN to be in occurrence then NO ONE could stop us in doing so!

As majority of them (protestors) are Sikhs because SIKHS HAVE THAT POWER AND STRENGTH TO STAND WITH THE RIGHT AND FOR THE RIGHT.

If you cannot praise their strength then don’t try to DEFAME them.

Godi Media and its role

The work of the media during these days has been remarked as the worst. They are not only playing the role of government’s puppet but also intimidating the general public to their extent.

For the media, the pursuit of profit drives far more than public interest and democracy.

Their pockets are filled with the money of rich and more powered people which overcomes the need and value of truth in their eyes.

Conclusion

To my mind, we do not need new laws if we can regulate the existing ones. Bringing them against the ones for whom these are made is more a lunacy. Criticizing or dominating the majority over this is the same.

Over 11 meetings have been held till date and still no rays of hope is seen. Government should have talked and resolved this issue quite earlier but better late than never.

“If things go wrong under the new Constitution, the reason will not be that we had a bad Constitution.

What we will have to say is that the man was vile.”

-Says DR. B. R. AMBEDKAR

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Written By-

Didar Kaur