Hindustan Times ST (Mumbai) - Live
Opposition joins farmers’ protest at Jantar Mantar
NEW DELHI: Leaders of 13 Opposition parties attended the farmers’ protest at Jantar Mantar against three controversial farm laws on Friday as disruptions and protests continued to rock Parliament for the 14th day with the Opposition sticking to its demand for a debate on the Pegasus phone hacking controversy.
Around 200 farmers have been camping at Jantar Mantar since July 22 to hold what they call a ‘kisan parliament’ (farmers’ parliament) to demonstrate against the three central laws that sparked protests in food bowl states immediately after being passed last year.
Congress leader Rahul Gandhi said at the site, “You all know what is happening in Parliament. We want to talk about the Pegasus in Parliament but they (government) are not allowing the issue of Pegasus to be raised.”
He blamed Prime Minister Narendra Modi. “(PM) Narendra Modi has snooped inside every Indian’s phone,” he said.
The former Congress chief also announced that the Opposition parties came to Jantar Mantar “to support farmers from all parts of India”.
“Nothing can be worked out through a discussion. These laws need to be repealed,” he said.
The visit to the protest site, as reported by HT on Friday, however, was not without some underlying tensions in the Opposition ranks. Trinamool Congress (TMC) sent three MPs to Jantar Mantar at 10 am, about two hours before Gandhi and other leaders met the farmers.
A senior TMC leader said their schedule was fixed last Tuesday while another leader suggested that TMC would maintain distance from any event seen to be “led” by Gandhi. In the morning meeting where
Gandhi was present, Mamata Banejree’s party sent representatives but not their floor leaders.
The Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK), Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), Shiv Sena, Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD), Samajwadi Party, Communist Party of India (Marxist), Communist Party of India, Indian Union Muslim League, Revolutionary Socialist Party, National Conference and Loktrantrik Janata Dal were present at Jantar Mantar, apart from the Congress.
The monsoon session of Parliament has been washed out by protests and disruptions by Opposition parties over the alleged snooping row, controversial farm bills and rising petrol prices, among other issues.
In the Lok Sabha, Congress leader Adhir Chowdhury cautioned the government that they are just “tenants” and “power and money” won’t last forever. He added that from the beginning of the session, the Opposition wanted to debate the three farm laws and the price rise.
Junior minister for parliamentary affairs Arjun Ram Meghwal retorted and said that, “Even the government wanted these debates but you (the Opposition) are not allowing us.”
With no end to logjam in sight, the government added four more bills, including a Constitutional amendment, in its agenda. It also wants to clear bills to create national commission for homeopathy and national commission for Indian system of medicines.
The most important among them is the 127th Constitution Amendment Bill 2021, which was cleared by the Union Cabinet earlier this week and aims to restore the power of states to identify backward castes, effectively bypassing a recent Supreme Court verdict that triggered protests in several states.
The amendment would require two-thirds majority in both Houses of Parliament of those present and voting.
Government managers said that two senior ministers Pralhad Joshi and Piyush Goyal are in talks with the Opposition to pass the bill. In the Business Advisory Committee meeting, the Congress leaders raised doubts on how the government can ensure that the Houses would be in order—a requirement to pass constitutional amendments. In the BAC, TMC leaders walked out protesting hurried passage of bills without any parliamentary scrutiny.
The Pegasus row erupted on July 18 after an international investigative consortium reported that the phones of Indian ministers, politicians, activists, businessmen and journalists were among the 50,000 numbers from around the world that were potentially targeted by the Israeli firm NSO Group’s phone hacking software.