"The PM in his announcement elaborated that the Acts were for the benefit of the farmers but the Centre could not convince a section of them": Nitish Kumar
While RJD supremo, Lalu Prasad, accused the "Capitalist-dependent" Narendra Modi government of creating an atmosphere of "mistrust" with its description of agitating farmers as "terrorists and anti-national". Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar have refused to comment on the announcement of withdrawal of the farm laws saying it is the decision of the prime minister himself.
“The central government got the farm laws cleared in Parliament. It was the decision of the PM. Now, he himself has announced that they will be repealed in the next session of Parliament. The decision is his, there cannot be any reaction to this,” the chief minister who had always spoken in support of the three contentious farm laws., told reporters. Nitish Kumar's party, the Janata Dal (United), is an ally of the BJP in Bihar and at the Centre.
Prasad, the JD(U) leader's arch-rival, congratulated farmers who had agitated for withdrawal of three contentious farm laws, calling their struggle "the longest, the most peaceful and the most democratic Satyagraha". "The capitalist-dependant government and its ministers called farmers terrorists, Khalistani and anti-national in order to destroy the country's unity and harmony. They (the government) created an atmosphere of mistrust in majority of the working class (shramjivi) people," he wrote on Twitter in Hindi.
The tweet of Prasad, who is keeping indifferent health for quite some time, came hours after Modi announced repeal of three farm laws, which had triggered an unprecedented year-long protest by the farming community at the borders of the national capital.
Prasad's heir apparent and leader of the opposition in the Bihar assembly, Tejashwi Yadav, claimed that the BJP decided to withdraw the farm laws out of the fear of losing the assembly polls in Uttar Pradesh, Punjab and Uttarakhand. “We opposed the farm laws. We had hit the streets in Bihar soon after the assembly polls (last year) but the anti-farmer Nitish-BJP government had slapped cases against me and our party workers,” Tejashwi Yadav said in a Twitter post in Hindi.
Asked to comment on Yadav's allegation, Kumar said, “Everybody has the right to speak. The opposition has every right to say what they think."
With PTI Inputs