CHANDIGARH: Haryana agriculture minister Jai Prakash Dalal courted another controversy on Saturday as he said that farmers who died during the agitation against the Centre’s three laws would have died in any case, even if they were at home.
“Lakh do lakh mein se 200 nahin marte kya. Yeh ghar mein hote toh bhi marte. Koiheart attack hoke mar raha hai, koi bukhar se” (Don’t you think that 200 people normally die out of 1-2 lakh people. They would have died anyway, even if they had been at home. They died either due to heart attack or on account of illness), the Haryana minister said during a media interaction at Bhiwani on Saturday.
Dalal was responding to a question seeking his reaction on the deaths of over 200 farmers who have died during the ongoing agitation against the three contentious laws. He went on to claim that all these deaths have taken place as per the average age of a person in the country.
Responding to a question about the huge movement of farmers from Haryana to the protest sites, Dalal said, “Farmers are innocent and they have been going either out of sympathy or because of caste.”
This is not the first time that Dalal, who represents Loharu constituency of Bhiwani district, has courted controversy because of his statements on the farmers’ issue. He was elected to the state assembly for the first time in October 2019 assembly polls and was appointed agriculture and farmer welfare minister in the Manohar Lal Khattar-led state government.
In December last year, while speaking to the media at Hisar, Dalal had said that foreign powers, including China, Pakistan, and other “enemy” countries, were behind the farmers’ agitation to destabilize the country in the name of farmers.
“The protest is not related to the cause of farmers, as several foreign powers like China, Pakistan, or other countries, which have hostility with India, want to destabilize the country in the name of the farmers’ agitation,” Dalal had said at that time. On farmers’ grouse against new agriculture bills, the minister had also equated the farmers with “a patient who does not want to take medicine prescribed by the doctor apprehending that he may die after consuming it.”
Sack him, demand Congress leaders
Congress leaders in Punjab and Haryana hit out at BJP’s Haryana minister Jai Prakash Dalal on a remark he made on deaths during the ongoing farmers agitation. “Only an insensitive and uncultured person can use such words for protesting farmers. The minister should be sacked from the state cabinet,” Randeep Singh Surjewala, senior Congress leader, said. “Is he a minister? Shame on him for such a statement,” Geeta Bhukkal, former minister and senior Congress leader, said. Congress MLA from Amritsar East Raj Kumar Verka said, “It seems that BJP leaders are celebrating the fact that over 200 farmers have died during the agitation against the Centre’s farm laws. He said that farmers had to die, and they did. It is shameful. He should be thrown out of the BJP. BJP should also apologise for this”