Modi government's land bill is anti-farmer, says Sonia Gandhi

Her son and party vice-president Rahul Gandhi, making his first major public appearance after returning from his two-month-long sabbatical, alleged that Mr Modi had brought in the new land law to “pay back huge loans” taken from corporate groups for the Lok Sabha polls, and vowed that the Congress would stand with farmers and workers wherever their land was being snatched.

“Enough is enough”, said Mrs Gandhi, accusing the government of “rubbing salt on the wounds of farmers hit hard by unseasonal rains”, and saying there was a “huge gap between the words and deeds” of the PM and the BJP. Former PM Manmohan Singh said the new land bill was nothing but an attempt to weaken the 2013 land law enacted by his government that was aimed at empowering farmers.

Mr Gandhi, for whom the Sunday rally at Ramlila was seen as a “relaunch” pad, attacked the PM for some remarks during his just-concluded foreign trip, where he had talked of “cleaning up the mess” left by the Congress-led government. Mr Gandhi said the remarks on foreign soil aimed at previous governments did not befit the office of PM.

“I will tell you how Modij won the election. He took loans of thousands of crores from big industrialists, from which his marketing was done. How will he pay back the loans now? He will do it by giving your land to those top industrialists. He wants to weaken farmers, then snatch their land and give it to his industrialist friends,” Mr Gandhi added.

Mr Gandhi said that through the Gujarat model, Mr Modi had showed he could snatch the land of farmers quite easily, and “convinced industrialists that he can do the same in the whole country”. Mr Gandhi said: “This is Modi’s model— weaken the foundation, then attach a ladder to the building, paint it bright and show to the world that the building is shining, when in fact it has become hollow.” The Congress mobilised farmers from Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Punjab and Delhi to show its strength.