Indian National Lok Dal (INLD) president Om Prakash Chautala on Tuesday visited two farmer protest sites and said the stir will force the government to scrap the “black farm laws” and the people will change the dispensation that brought in these legislations.
The former Haryana Chief Minister said this fight is not only of farmers and labourers. “It is the fight of the whole nation, and the eyes of the whole world are on this farmers’ agitation.”
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Mr. Chautala (86) had said he would visit protest sites to extend his support to the farmers and on Tuesday, he went to Palwal in Haryana and Ghazipur in Uttar Pradesh.
The INLD has extended support to the farmers who are protesting against the Centre’s farm laws. His son and senior party leader Abhay Singh Chautala had earlier resigned as MLA from the Haryana Assembly in their support. Several farmers have been protesting against the farm laws at Palwal and Ghazipur for months.
Addressing a farmers’ gathering in Palwal, Mr. Chautala said, “If farmers are happy, then the country is prosperous, if they are not happy, the nation cannot progress...It is because of wrong policies of the BJP government that lives of people in different sections of society, including farmers, have become difficult. This government wants to make pro-corporate policies.”
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He said the stir against the farm laws is going strong as it has countrywide support and the agitation will force the government to “scrap the farm laws”. “This government which brought these legislations will also be changed by the people..,” he said, adding that his party is standing in support of the farmers.
Mr. Chautala said all his life, former Deputy Prime Minister Devi Lal struggled to ensure that farmers, weaker sections and other common people get their due. “We want to realise the dreams of late Chaudhary Devi Lal. All his life he struggled for one thing — that hard working farmers and the common man should be happy,” he said.
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The INLD president also attacked the BJP-led dispensations at the Centre and in Haryana, claiming that they had made tall promises at the time of elections, “but when they came to power they did just the opposite”.
“In a democratic set up, people elect their government whose responsibility is to work towards the people’s welfare. However, today various sections are fed up with their misrule,” he claimed.