Amritsar, June 13

At a time when state BJP leaders are being heckled as a fallout of the central farm laws, state party chief Ashwani Sharma has said the party will contest all 117 seats in the 2022 Assembly elections.

“We will field our party candidates on all Assembly seats and intend to form a new peaceful and drug-free Punjab where the residents, traders and farmers will feel secure under the law of land, where the Dalits and backward classes would not be suppressed,” said Sharma, who was in Amritsar today.

On the protest against the farm laws, he said: “Behind the agitation were the ‘forces’ whose intentions were to make political gains by prolonging it. Otherwise, the BJP-led Centre has already offered to suspend the farm laws for two years and constitute a five-member panel to end the impasse. Why didn’t farmers accept it?”

On facing opposition from a few party leaders who claim the state unit failed to guide farmers, he said, “How could the 11 rounds of meeting be conducted without the intervention of state BJP leaders?” — TNS