Rajya Sabha passes Farm Bills

New Delhi: The Rajya Sabha on Sunday passed two contentious farm Bills — The Farmers Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Bill, 2020; and The Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement on Price Assurance and Farm Services Bill, 2020– amid a major ruckus by Opposition parties.

The Bills, which seek to replace the two ordinances promulgated on June 5 this year and which were already cleared by the Lok Sabha, were passed by voice vote in the Upper House.

The House witnessed tumultuous scenes during the passage of the Bills as members from the Opposition parties snatched and threw papers from the table and even broke the chairman's mic.

The Opposition claimed the NDA government did not have the numbers and there was rampant violation of rules that helped the BJP. "This does not end here," said Trinamool Congress's Derek O'Brien, terming it a "murder of democracy". The Opposition MPs sat in protest inside the House for a while, and later, 47 of them moved a no-confidence motion against Rajya Sabha Deputy Chairperson Harivansh Singh.

"They cheated. They broke every rule in Parliament. It was a historic day. In the worst sense of the word."

"They cut RSTV feed so the country couldn't see. They censored RSTV. Don't spread propaganda. We have evidence," Derek O'Brien later tweeted.

The Opposition had demanded that the Bills be sent to a select committee for further discussion.

The trouble started as the Deputy Chairman said the Opposition resolution was negated and moved to pass the Bills by voice vote. The Opposition demanded a physical voting, pointing out that they were sitting in Parliament. When the Chair refused, they rushed to the Well of the House, attempted to tear up the rule book and tried to snatch the Deputy Chairman's microphone. "Mahabharat has broken out inside Parliament," Congress's Ghulam Nabi Azad said. Opposition MPs could be seen recording the moment on cellphones, drawing repeated rebuke from the chair.

Insisting that the rules were not being followed, O' Brien, whose point of order was not accepted, said, "This is a brutal murder of the Parliamentary democratic system". The House was adjourned immediately for 10 minutes and after it resumed, the voice vote took place amid repeated slogans from the opposition who again parked themselves in the Well of the House. In a video statement, O'Brien who could earlier be seen waving the rule book, later said the Rajya Sabha TV was "cut off" and censored". "The members of the Opposition asked for a vote. We were denied it... It is a historic day, in the worst sense," he tweeted.

In the morning, while introducing the Bill, the government said the Bills are "historic". The BJP insists that the Farmers' Produce Trade and Commerce Bill, and the Price Assurance and Farm Services Bill, will bring a change in the lives of the farmers.

In June, three agriculture-related ordinances were issued - the Farmers' Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Ordinance, Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement on Price Assurance and Farm Services Ordinance, and The Essential Commodities (Amendment) Ordinance 2020. To convert them into laws in the current session, the three corresponding Bills have been passed by the Lok Sabha.