Anything short of repealing the farm laws would be a betrayal of India and its farmers, former Congress president Rahul Gandhi said on Thursday.
Several other leaders, especially from Punjab, endorsed Mr. Gandhi’s demand for a complete rollback of the farm laws.
Tagging Mr. Gandhi’s comment, cricketer-turned-politician Navjot Sidhu tweeted, “No Compromise on this Stand !!!”.
Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, in a tweet, attacked BJP leaders for branding farmers as “traitors” and calling their protests an international conspiracy.
Former Law Minister Ashwani Kumar said the government should not make the farm bills a matter of “prestige”. “Without standing on prestige, the Central government should suspend the operation of controversial laws and respect the sentiments of the community for whose benefit the laws are stated to have been passed. It is indeed a strange situation where the ostensible beneficiaries of laws believe that the laws are in fact detrimental to their interests and yet these are being imposed on them,” Mr. Kumar said in a statement.
“Any democratic government responsive to public sensitivities would have averted this wholly avoidable situation through early and meaningful discussion with the protesting farmers. Instead, the government resorted to tear gas and water cannons on a cold November night against the nation’s defenders and feeders,” he added.