The Congress on Thursday urged President Ram Nath Kovind to ensure that the three “anti-farmer, anti-agriculture, anti-poor and black” laws enacted in September are repealed. It added the “autocratic” Modi government refuses to hear the agony and anguish of farmers. The party also demanded that the government convene a special joint session of Parliament to withdraw these laws.
A Congress delegation, led by Rahul Gandhi, met the President and submitted a memorandum along with 20 million signatures collected in the past three months against the three laws.
“Present day government seems to serve the interest of only a handful of its crony capitalist friends vis-à-vis lives and livelihood of 62 crore [620 million] farmers and farm labourers,” read the memorandum.
The delegation earlier gathered at the party headquarters in New Delhi before proceeding to the Rashtrapati Bhawan to meet the President.
The Delhi Police did not allow Congress general secretary in-charge of Uttar Pradesh, Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, and some other leaders to proceed to the Rashtrapati Bhawan and took them into preventive custody.
Rahul Gandhi, Leader of the Opposition in the Rajya Sabha, Ghulam Nabi Azad, and the party’s leader in the Lok Sabha, Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury, were allowed to go to the Rashtrapati Bhawan to meet the President.
“I told the President that these laws are anti-farmer. The country has seen that farmers have stood up against these laws,” Rahul Gandhi told reporters after meeting the President. “I want to tell Prime Minister Narendra Modi that these farmers are not going to go back home until these laws are repealed. The government should convene a joint session of Parliament and take back these laws.”
