BJP, CONGRESS TRADE BARBS OVER FARM LAWS, R-DAY VIOLENCE

NEW DELHI: Union minister Prakash Javadekar on Wednesday accused the Congress party of trying to create a “situation of unrest” in the country and alleged that it has been provoking farmers against three agricultural laws, which have triggered widespread protests.

A day after violence broke out during a tractor rally in the national capital, Javadekar said the government has already held 11 rounds of talks with farmers and offered to put in abeyance the farm laws for 18 months.

“These laws make an effort to give the farmers an option, but the Congress does not want this to happen. I feel those who have lost elections, they are all getting together to spoil the atmosphere in the country,” Javadekar said.

“The Congress is disappointed; it has been losing elections and the communists are also losing (in elections)...they just want to create unrest through violence...,” he said.

The Congress, however, put the blame for the violence on the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

Congress chief spokesperson Randeep Surjewala said the government is adopting “a policy of first hit, torment and defeat the farmers, then tiring them out through various rounds of talks, trying to divide them and by now defaming them through such miscreants who created violence during their tractor march”.

“A concerted conspiracy, aided and abetted by the Modi government is unfolding to malign the entire farmers’ movement and to push them out and bury the demand for repeal of the three anti-agriculture black laws under the din and noise of FIRS,” the Congress spokesperson told reporters.

These laws make an effort to give the farmers an option, but Congress does not want this to happen PRAKASH JAVADEKAR, Union minister