Lucknow: Workers of the Congress and the Pragatisheel Samajwadi Party (Lohia) staged protests against the new farm laws and other issues in the state capital on Monday. Uttar Pradesh Congress Committee (UPCC) president Ajay Kumar Lallu and other party workers were held during their protest, while police personnel with ‘lathis’ stopped members of the Pragatisheel Samajwadi Party’s students’ wing as they tried to march towards the chief minister’s residence.
The Shekhar Dixit-led Rashtriya Kisan Manch, meanwhile, said the new farm laws would help “save farmers from the exploitation of middlemen” and slammed the organisations opposing the measures. Led by the UPCC president, Congress workers from all over the state converged at the Parivartan Chowk here and staged a protest against the “anti-farm” laws, the party’s media convenor, Lalan Kumar, said.
While trying to move towards the Raj Bhawan, party workers and its chief were held, Kumar said. There are reports from some districts that party workers, who were on their way to Lucknow to take part in the programme, were detained and not allowed to proceed, Lalan claimed.
The workers raised slogans against the new laws, he said. Members of the Pragatisheel Samajwadi Party’s students’ wing, led by its state unit president Dinesh Singh Yadav, gathered at the party office here to march towards the chief minister’s residence to protest against problems faced by students, farmers, traders and common people, a party statement said.
As the workers began their march, police stopped them and took them into custody, it added. Rashtriya Kisan Manch president Shekhar Dixit said the farm laws would benefit the farmers in the country.
Accusing the opposition of “shedding crocodile tears”, he said, “The Farmers’ Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Bill would give farmers the freedom to sell their produce anywhere in the country. It would help save farmers from the exploitation of middlemen. It seems that these organisations were waiting for the passage of these bills so that they may again come to limelight through agitation.” President Ram Nath Kovind on Sunday gave assent to three contentious farm bills passed in Parliament last week that have triggered farmers’ protest in some states. These three farm bills are: The Farmers’ Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Bill, 2020, The Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement of Price Assurance and Farm Services Bill, 2020 and The Essential Commodities (Amendment) Bill, 2020.
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