Cong shedding crocodile tears over farmers, says Badal

Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal today held Congress responsible for farmers’ problems and said the party was shedding crocodile tears over the peasant-issue and its rally in New Delhi was a political gimmick.

“This rally of the Congress is a political gimmick, the sole aim of which is to score brownie points before media rather than solving any problem faced by the farmers,” Badal told reporters at the sidelines of a convocation function at Shaheed Bhagat Singh State Technical Campus here.

The five-time Chief Minister said it was a fact that the farmers of the country were facing a number of problems “only due to the regressive policies of the Congress”. Questioning the Congress’ moral right to hold farmers’ rally in New Delhi, he said the party was root cause of farmers’ agonies so it has no moral right to organise such rally.

Terming as the best in country the ‘Punjab model’ of land acquisition, he said the farmers in the state had been duly compensated whenever land had been acquired for development purposes.