Kejriwal undermined farmers by notifying farm law: Punjab CM

Chandigarh, Dec 2 : In a scathing response to his Delhi counterpart’s attack on him over the farmers’ issue, Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh on Wednesday lashed out at Arvind Kejriwal for stooping to a low level of politics and indulging in brazen double-speak in a desperate bid to wriggle out of his own failure to protect the interests of the farming community.
Slamming the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) chief for undermining the farmers’ fight by notifying one of the central laws in Delhi, Amarinder Singh asked Kejriwal, “Why did you not stand against the Centre by passing your own state legislations like we did in Punjab?” The Chief Minister trashed Kejriwal’s assertion that states are helpless against the Central farm laws, and said it is clear that the AAP leader did not even want to try to fight the draconian legislations.
“Why else did he not bring any legislation in the state assembly to at least try and negate some of the ill-effects of the Central laws,” asked Amarinder Singh.
Instead of just meekly notifying the Central laws, Kejriwal could have tried to make some effort to counter them and protect the rights of the farmers, Amarinder Singh said in a statement.
As for the legality of the Punjab state amendment bills, the Chief Minister pointed out that these are valid under the Constitution and have a strong precedent in the bills that were passed by the Gujarat government in 2015 under Article 254 (II) of the Constitution to oppose the Centre’s land acquisition laws.