RS passes 2 Farm Bills; Oppn members tear papers, heckle presiding officer
| Date :21-Sep-2020 |
TMC MP Derek O’Brien attempts to tear the rule book as ruckus erupts in the RS. (R) Union Minister Narendra Singh Tomar celebrates with farmers after the passing of two farm bills in Rajya Sabha in New Delhi on Sunday. (PTI)
NEW DELHI,
RAJYA Sabha on Sunday passed two key Farm Bills amid a bedlam as Opposition members charged towards the podium of the presiding officer, flung the rule book at him, tore official papers and heckled him over their demand for a division of vote. The Upper House, which witnessed a brief adjournment due to the pandemonium, passed by voice vote the Farmer’s Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Bill, 2020, and the Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement of Price Assurance and Farm Services Bill, 2020.
The bills have already been passed by Lok Sabha and will now go to the President for his assent before they are notified as laws. Trouble started when the sitting of the House was extended beyond the scheduled time to allow passage of the bills. Opposition members, who felt such a move should be resorted to only by consensus, rushed into the Well, shouting slogans against the Government and accusing it of being anti-farmer. This forced Agriculture Minister Narendra Singh Tomar to cut short his reply and Deputy Chairman Harivansh took up the approval of the bills.
Four Opposition sponsored motions to send the two bills to a House panel for greater scrutiny were negated by voice vote, but the Congress, TMC, CPM and DMK members sought a division of vote on the issue. As Harivansh over-ruled them saying division of votes can take place only when members are on their seat, TMC leader Derek O’Brien charged towards the podium, thrusting the rule book into the face of the Deputy Chairman. House marshals thwarted the move as also blocking a book that was flung towards Harivansh. An attempt was also made to pulls microphones away from the chair but the marshals physically stopped that from happening.
DMK leader Tiruchi Siva, who along with O’Brien, K C Venugopal of Congress and K K Ragesh of CPM had moved resolutions for sending the bills to the select committee, tore papers and flung them into the air. Harivansh, who asked members to go back to their places and not come into the Well due to the COVID-19 protocol requiring physical separation, first muted the audio of the live proceedings but with the ruckus continuing, he adjourned the proceedings for 15 minutes.
When the House reassembled, Opposition parties chanted slogans but this did not prevent Harivansh from putting the bill to voice vote. As the first bill got voice approval of the House and motions for sending it to a select committee were rejected, at least two members tried to climb on the table of Rajya Sabha officers but were pulled down. Both the bills were passed by voice vote and amendments moved by the Opposition parties rejected. In his reply to the debate on the bill, Tomar said minimum price or MSP based procurement of agriculture crops from farmers will continue and is not related to the farm bills that seek to give cultivators freedom to market their produce.
Tomar said several sectors were impacted during the coronavirus times but not agriculture which saw a bumper crop and has record sowing of Kharif. Contribution from the agri-sector in GDP did not decline, said Tomar while thanking the farmers. He sought to allay fears that the bills were an attempt to dilute the country’s public procurement system and will lead to exploitation by private companies, saying the Minimum Support Price (MSP)-based buying by the Government will continue. “Purchase on MSP was done in the past, continues now and it will be continued in the future. There is no room for doubt on this,” he said. Mandis will not stop functioning and trading will continue as before. Under contract farming, the farmer will have full powers to fix a sale price of his choice and they will receive full payment within three days, he said.
Watershed moment for Indian agriculture: PM
NEW DELHI,
Sept 20 (PTI)
PRIME Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday described the passage of two farm sector bills as a “watershed moment” in the history of Indian agriculture, asserting that they will ensure a complete transformation of the farm sector and empower crores of farmers.
Modi said these proposed laws will liberate farmers from numerous adversities as he noted that peasants were for decades bound by various constraints and bullied by middlemen. He again assured farmers that the existing Government support system for them will continue.
Oppn members’ conduct in RS ‘shameful’: Rajnath
NEW DELHI,
Sept 20 (PTI)
THE top brass of the Central Governm-ent on Sunday flayed the Opposition over its members’ “unruly conduct” in Rajya Sabha during the passage of the two farm bills, condemning their behaviour as “shameful” and unprecedented in Parliament’s history. Union Ministers Rajnath Singh, Prakash Javadekar, Pralhad Joshi, Piyush Goyal, Thawarchand Gehlot and Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi held a press conference to hit out at Opposition members, with Singh asserting that such conduct was not expected in a healthy democracy.