Chandigarh: Punjab Congress today asked Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal to immediately call an “emergency session” of the state Assembly and lead an all-party delegation to Prime Minister Narendra Modi over farmers’ issue. State Congress chief Pratap Singh Bajwa in a statement here today called upon Badal to call an emergency session of the Assembly.
He also asked the Chief Minister to lead an all-party delegation to the PM “to take up the issues agitating the farmers leading to increasing incidence of suicides”. Stating that farmers’ issues concern the entire country, he said, “Punjabi farmers played a stellar role in providing food security to the country but the tragedy is that, in this food bowl of the country they are forced to commit suicide due to deepening crisis in the farm sector.”
Demanding crop loan waiver for the farmers, Bajwa said, “The families of farmers who had committed suicide have been waiting for years for compensation and the official apathy and the delay defeated the very purpose of providing some relief to the bereaved family.”
“We also demand a package for the debt ridden farmers of the state on the lines of the one given by UPA earlier,” the Punjab Congress chief said. “It is understandable that state government can’t deal with the problem that needs a comprehensive approach,” he said adding the state government must initiate steps that were within its powers to resolve the issue. “The rest should be taken care of by the Union government which should evolve a comprehensive agrarian policy keeping in view different situation in each state,” Bajwa said.
