New Delhi: Farmers gather at Tikri border during their sit-in protest against the Centre's farm reform laws, in New Delhi, Saturday, Dec. 19, 2020.
In letters to Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Agriculture Minister Narendra Singh Tomar, the All India Kisan Sangharsh Coordination Committee on Saturday asserted the ongoing farmers' protests are not affiliated to any political party. In separate letters in Hindi to Modi and Tomar, the AIKSCC said that the government is wrong in assuming that the farmers' agitation against the three farm laws is being engineered by opposition parties. It comes a day after the prime minister accused the opposition parties of misleading farmers over the three farm laws.
"The truth is that the farmers' agitation has forced political parties to change their views and your (PM's) claim that political parties fuelled it (protest) is wrong," AIKSCC, which is one of around 40 unions protesting at several Delhi border points for the 23 last days, said in its letter to the prime minister.
Addressing farmers of Madhya Pradesh on Friday, Modi had defended the new farm laws, saying they were in the works for decades and those who are opposing them now for gaining lost political ground were once votaries of the same reforms.
The opposition parties were against the new laws as they were upset that he would get the credit, Modi said, adding that he did not seek any credit but nobody should mislead farmers.
In the letter, the AIKSCC said, "Any demand of any protesting farmer union and group is not affiliated to a political party."
In the open letter to the agriculture minister, the farmer union alleged discrepancies in the three farm laws.
The AIKSCC alleged that the minister was diverting the main issues of farmers from the discussion.
In an open letter addressing farmers, Tomar had Thursday accused the Congress and other opposition parties of spreading falsehood about the new farm laws.
He had also appealed to the agitating farmers not to fall prey to these "white lies" and said the Centre was ready to address all their concerns.
The minister, in an eight-page open letter to farmers, had said the Modi-government was committed to their welfare and stressed that the new legislation were aimed at benefitting small and marginal farmers.
