Union Agriculture Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan on Friday hit back at Opposition parties for accusing the BJP of betraying farmers, stating that it was the AAP government in Punjab that had evicted agitating farmers from the state’s Shambhu and Khanauri borders with Haryana.
Chouhan made these remarks during a discussion in the Lok Sabha on the demands for grants for the Agriculture Ministry. He emphasized that the BJP-led government at the Centre had engaged with farmers in a respectful and constructive manner, citing that at least three Union ministers had met with protesting farmers. He pointed out the contradiction, saying that the Congress and AAP had been allies until the Lok Sabha elections, and now they were blaming the BJP for the eviction of farmers. He added, “They dug up a mountain only to find a dead rat,” suggesting that the Opposition’s attempts to label the BJP as anti-farmer had failed.
Chouhan further claimed that previous prime ministers, including Jawaharlal Nehru, had not initiated significant measures for farmers. In contrast, the BJP-led NDA government in the last 10 years had introduced important policies such as the crop insurance scheme and increased the Minimum Support Price (MSP) for various crops, focusing on the welfare of small and marginal farmers.
Meanwhile, Congress MP Charanjeet Singh Channi from Jalandhar criticized both the central and Punjab governments for betraying farmers. Channi accused them of working together to evict farmers from their protest sites at Shambhu and Khanauri borders. He alleged that while the farmers were on their way to Delhi last year to meet the Union government, the central government had blocked their path and falsely blamed them for disrupting the economy. He further accused the Punjab government of breaking its promises to the farmers, initially assuring them of talks but later uprooting them from their protest locations.
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