Member opts out of SC-appointed panel
Bhupinder Singh Mann won’t be part of 4-member panel on farm laws, cites ‘interest of farmers’
NEW DELHI: Bhupinder Singh Mann, a key farm union leader appointed by the Supreme Court to a panel it had formed to scrutinise three contentious farms laws, has declined the job citing the “interests” of farmers.
Mann, a former MP and the national president of the Bharatiya Kisan Union, a farm union, said he was “recusing” himself from the committee of four set by the Supreme Court to look into farmers’ grievances over the laws.
On January 12, the Supreme Court took the unprecedented step of staying the three contentious farm laws that have brought tens of thousands of protesting farmers to Delhi’s doorstep, and formed a fourmember committee — comprising economists Ashok Kumar Gulati and PK Joshi as well as farm union leaders Anil Ghanwat and Mann as members — to discuss the legislation with both farmers and the government and make recommendations to the court.
While putting the laws on hold amid massive protests at Delhi’s borders, the court held that suspension of the legislation “may assuage the hurt feelings of the farmers and encourage them to come to the negotiating table with confidence and good faith”.
The panel formed by the Supreme Court has attracted public criticism because all four members named for the panel had either endorsed the farm laws or suggested improvements. Protesting farm unions said such a committee was already biased in favour of reforms and they will not appear before the group. Their leaders claimed that the members of the committee are “pro-government”.
“As a farmer myself and a union leader, in view of the prevailing sentiments and apprehensions among the farmers and public in general, I am ready to sacrifice any position offered or given to me so as not to compromise the interests of Punjab and the farmers of the country,” Mann said in a press statement.
Mann is the chairman of the All India Kisan Coordination Committee, a platform of farm unions who have supported the farm laws. Mann had met Union agriculture minister Narendra
Singh Tomar in December, urging him not to repeal the laws. This pitted him against hundreds of other farm unions demanding a repeal.
An official of the agriculture ministry declined to comment on Mann’s move, saying this was a Supreme Court-monitored process.
Farm unions protesting the laws to open up agricultural markets said they were indifferent to Mann’s decision. “Our stand is we will not take part in any consultations by the courtappointed committee because our only demand is repeal of the laws,” said Darshan Pal, a senior member of the Sanyukt Kisan Morcha, the organisation leading the farmers’ protests.
“Mann’s decision is a good step as there is no importance of any committee for farmer unions as it has not been our demand. Mann knew that no farmer union would appear before the court-appointed committee that’s why he has taken this decision,” farmer leader Gurnam Singh Chaduni said.
Bhartiya Kisan Union leader Rakesh Tikait also welcomed Mann’s decision and invited him to join the ongoing agitation against the three laws.