Background
The Farm bill agitations by farmers have intensified after the failure of talks between the farm unions and BJP led centre government. The Farm unions have announced to meet on 20th October to decide on further course and direction of protests.
Farm unions and opposition parties had requested Captain Amrinder Singh to bring in a session of Punjab Assembly to quash the state APMC act and declare entire Punjab as one Mandi. Captain Amrinder singh took his time to call the session not succumbing to the ultimatum of Farm unions and Shiromani Akali Dal.
A cabinet meeting of MLA’s held today decided unanimously to support captain Amrinder Singh’s decisions in the session to be held tomorrow. This means that an absolute power has been conferred to the chief minister by the cabinet.
Likely outcomes of the session
Everybody is waiting eagerly for the outcomes of the Punjab Assembly sessions. Some even believe that Captain holds the key to end the whole agitation by making key decisions. I have been following farmers agitation closely and here are the possible outcomes—
Possibility 1- Captain Amrinder Singh might go with the easier option of using Sonia Gandhi’s suggestion to negate Centre’s farm laws using Article 254 (2). This if done will solve the problem and will give farmers the much needed happiness. The whole responsibility of taking it forward will then rest on Punjab government.
Possibility 2- Captain Amrinder singh has another option that is widely discussed by farm unions and Shiromani Akali Dal; to declare entire Punjab as one Mandi by abolishing APMC act. This if put in action will make sure that captain wins 2022 by huge margins, but doing this is not easy task. Rahul Gandhi and Sonia Gandhi have maintained it as a part of their manifesto to keep APMC act and implement it throughout India. Congress party will have to go against its own manifesto to abolish APMC tomorrow.
Possibility-3- Declaration Of MSP as Statuary Clause and its violations deemed to be punishable. This is another likely possibility that has potential to end the farm agitations in one go.
The press release of Congress party however looks disappointing and I won’t be surprised if Congress just passes a resolution to go to Supreme Court against Centre’s laws with P. Chidambaram or Kapil Sibal as its lawyers. This possibility as outcome of session is most likely and would not change anything on ground.
Criticisms by opposition
Shiromani Akali Dal’s Bikram Singh Majithia held a press conference and expressed sadness that NO AGENDA or BUSINESS purpose has been given to opposition parties. He said “The session extension is unconstitutional and Congress party has extended the one day session to a two day session when it is the speaker who can make that decision.” He added that “no agenda or purpose of session has been shared with us”. Taunting Congress govt he said that Amrinder singh is playing a fixed match with Modi.
AAP delegation also held a press conference and announced that congress has called the session in an unconstitutional manner without sharing agenda. AAP members met the speaker and requested for a longer session of seven days to discuss the resolutions that congress party plans to bring forth.
It will be interesting to note what actually comes out after the session tomorrow at 11am.
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