Congress holds marches to protest agriculture, labour laws

The Congress on Friday held marches and sit-ins in all assembly constituencies and district headquarters across the country to protest the "anti-farmer" and "anti-labour" bills passed by Parliament recently, the party said.

The Congress state units observed the day as “Kisan Mazdoor Bachao Divas”, party general secretary in-charge organization, K C Venugopal, said in a statement.

'Dharnas', marches and protests were held on the occasion of the birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi and former Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri.

Congress workers held dharnas and protests across the country seeking the immediate withdrawal of the "anti-farmers" and "anti-labour" bills, the statement said.

These protests, carried out in consonance with the Covid-related safety guidelines, were aimed at rallying farmers, farmworkers and other stakeholders against the legislations enacted in gross disregard of the interests of farmers and labour with the sole aim of benefitting crony corporates, the party alleged.

The crony capitalists will stand to gain even as the farmers are subjugated without the basic security of the Minimum Support Price and labour will lose out on basic minimum job security, it claimed.

Friday also marked the beginning of a signature campaign by PCCs to reach out to farmers, farm labourers, Mandi workers, industrial labour and sundry employees of APMCs, the party said.

This month-long signature campaign will collect signatures from two crore farmers and labourers across the country, it said.

A substantive memorandum along with the signature of two crore farmers will then be submitted to the President of India on November 14, the birth anniversary of India's first prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru.