Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury, Congress leader in Lok Sabha, on Sunday wrote to Prime Minister Narendra Modi regarding the newly-enacted farm laws. In the letter, Chowdhury urged PM Modi to repeal the three farm laws sans making it a ‘prestige issue’.

Chowdhury said the three laws are “anti-farmer” and corporate-friendly, and they will end up “hurting” farmers’ earnings.

“I request you not to make this a prestige issue. The government must bow to the supreme will and aspirations of the people and accordingly repeal the farm laws at the earliest, as the livelihood of millions of farmers is at stake,” news agency PTI reported.

Meanwhile, Congress MPs from Punjab have planned a protest at Jantar Mantar for convening an early session of Parliament to repeal the farm laws.

The Congress has also extended its support to the ‘Bharat Bandh’ call given by farmer unions seeking the repeal of farm laws.

Chowdhury said in his letter that through these contentious laws, the Minimum Support Price guarantee, farmers’ safety net since the Green Revolution of 1960s, is being “snatched away” under the pretext of giving them more playing ground and better platforms to sell their produce.

The government has reiterated on multiple occasions that the new laws will not touch the MSP regime and also that these legislations will help farmers raise their incomes.

“The bills have not been discussed in the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Agriculture and have been hurriedly passed amid ruckus through a voice vote.

“I may like to remind you that the essence of a democracy is ‘government of the people, by the people and for the people’. There have been many precedents of repeal of the bills/laws passed by Parliament,” the senior Congress leader told the prime minister.