PM, ministers should sleep on floor till farmers out in cold: Bittu

Aditi Tandon
Tribune News Service
New Delhi, December 27

Ludhiana MP Ravneet Singh Bittu on Sunday launched a scathing attack on the Centre for its “stubbornness” over the farm laws and said Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his entire cabinet should sleep on the floor till the time farmers are out protesting in the cold.

Addressing reporters at a press conference arranged by the Congress for the party's Punjab leaders who have been sitting on a dharna at Jantar Mantar since 20 days, Bittu said the farmers would consider trusting the PM if he repealed at least two of the three controversial laws before the December 29 meeting with the farmers' unions.

“The government should stop being so obstinate and should repeal the laws on electricity dues and stubble burning penalty,” Bittu said flanked by Khadoor Saheb MP JS Gill and Punjab Congress MLAs Kulbir Jira and Ravinder Amla, who have been staging a dharna at Jantar Mantar for days in support of farmers.

Bittu said the farmers were very unhappy and their sons, who are guarding the borders, are “asking daily when the PM will send their parents home.”

“What do you want? The sons of these farmers are guarding our borders.

They are asking when will PM send our parents home. Else they will take leave and come home. Punjab and Haryana giving soldiers to defend the borders and food to fill the granaries and what age you doing? You are killing Punjabis at the border also and here also,” said Bittu.

He accused the government of leaving farmers in the lurch — “you don’t want to let him live or die,” he said asking the PM and all cabinet ministers to sleep on floors while farmers agitate on Delhi borders.

JS Gill said actor Sushant Rajput's suicide caused so much furore nationally while the suicide of Baba Ram Singh killed didn’t cause any flutter.

“Value of every life should be the same,” Gill said adding that the PM will not become small by retracting the laws.

Admission of fault is a courageous thing to do, he said.

“You won’t lose if you retract. Acknowledgement of wrongdoing is courageous. You will become bigger with conceding. They must realise that the farmers of Punjab and Haryana who were divided previously stand united due to farm laws,” Gill said.

Gill also attacked the BJP governments registering cases against protesting farmers in Haryana, Madhya Pradesh and Uttarakhand.

“The farmers are not afraid of these cases. PM must repeal laws,” he said with Bittu and Jira asking why the PM did not speak of farmers in his Mann ki Baat, the last edition this year.

Bittu also said there was no dearth of money for farmers as NRIs from Punjab have a lot of money to support them.

How many accounts will you freeze, Bittu asked the Government.

He said MSP is being granted only in Punjab, Haryana, UP.

“Rest of the farmers in other states haven’t tasted MSP. The government should be stubborn. No political party can’t mobilise people for so many days. This is a genuine farmer protest and PM must listen,” Bittu said.