Punjab Congress chief Partap Singh Bajwa today slammed Agriculture Minister Radha Mohan Singh for attributing farmer suicides to "drugs, love affairs and impotency", while demanding an apology from Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
"It is shocking that Radha Mohan Singh today denied in his written reply that more than 1,400 farmer suicides in the country were not due to financial distress but due to drugs and impotency," Bajwa said.
The Congress leader said that the Modi government should hang its head in shame and the PM should apologise for such statements by his ministers.
Bajwa said that the Union Minister insulted the farmer community with his reply, as various studies have pinpointed the cause of the increasing suicides to crisis in the farm sector.
He expressed surprise that the minister had referred to 'debt' as only one of the reasons behind the suicides along with family problems, illness, dowry, love affairs and impotency.
"This was not only clumsy but shameful, appalling and reprehensible cover up for a national tragedy with which those who feed the nation were confronted with," he said.
He said the "awfully disgusting statement" made by Singh has exposed the farmers' disdain under this government, especially the move to amend the land acquisition legislation which was an "effort to wipe out the farmers themselves".
"What Radha Mohan Singh has stated in the Rajya Sabha is part of the conspiracy to malign the farmers and grab their lands to please the corporate sector that funded the ruling part's campaign", he alleged.
Reports were appearing almost every day of farmers committing suicides and nowhere had it been mentioned that the reasons were some other frustrations rather than debt burden, he said.
Citing National Crime Record Bureau (NCRB) data, the Agriculture Minister also revealed that 65.75 per cent of the farmers who committed suicide were in the age group of 30 to 60 years, while 59 per cent were below 18 years of age.
Agriculture Minister Radha Mohan Singh kicked up a storm in Parliament today while replying on farmer suicide, where he referred love affairs as a reason behind the extreme step taken by the farmers.
His statement was condemned by the opposition who accused the government of being insensitive.
