Rahul Gandhi slams Centre over 'anti-agriculture laws'

Amid the ongoing farmers' protest, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Friday termed the new farm laws as "anti-agriculture law" and accused the Centre of capitalism, demanding the withdrawal of the laws.

Amid the ongoing farmers' protest, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Friday termed the new farm laws as "anti-agriculture laws" and accused the Centre of promoting capitalism, demanding the withdrawal of the laws.

"Will not let the fields become sand, will not let them gift it to their friends. Withdraw the anti-agriculture laws! #FarmersProtest," said the Congress MP in a tweet today.

Earlier, the Wayanad MP had attacked the Centre on several occasions for passing the new agri laws accusing the central government of "designing them to destroy the agriculture business" and "hand it over to Prime Minister Narendra Modi's friends".

While addressing an event in Wayanad in February this year, he had said, "The entire world can see the difficulty faced by Indian farmers, but the government in Delhi is unable to understand the pain of the farmers. We have pop stars who are commenting on the situation of the farmers but the Indian government is not interested. They are not going to take back these three new laws unless they are forced and there is a reason for it."

"The reason is that these three new laws are designed to destroy the agricultural system in India and give the entire business to two or three of Narendra Modi's friends," he had alleged.

The Congress leader's remarks came as farmers have been protesting on the different borders of the national capital since November 26 last year against the three newly enacted farm laws: Farmers' Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Act, 2020; the Farmers Empowerment and Protection) Agreement on Price Assurance and farm Services Act 2020 and the Essential Commodities (Amendment) Act, 2020.

Farmer leaders and the Centre have held several rounds of talks but the impasse remains.

( With inputs from ANI )