LUCKNOW: In order to re-draw the government’s attention to the three contentious farm laws, Bharatiya Kisan Union’s (BKU) national spokesman Rakesh Tikait, took to Twitter on Friday to seek the intervention of US President Joe Biden to get the laws scrapped.
Notably, Prime Minister Narendra Modi is on a 5-day visit to the United States currently. Tikait’s tweet tagging @POTUS, the US president’s Twitter handle, has set off a storm in the political circles as it has come hours ahead of meeting between the two leaders.
“Dear @POTUS, we the Indian farmers are protesting against 3 farm laws brought by PM Modi’s govt. 700 farmers have died in the last 11 months protesting. These black laws should be repealed to save us. Please focus on our concern while meeting PM Modi,” Tikait, the farmers’ leader spearheading the farmers' protest against the three farm laws, tweeted.
The tweet, which had the #“Biden_SpeakUp4Farmers”, began trending in India. Friday’s meeting would be the first in-person meeting of the leaders of the Quad grouping of countries whose members are the United States, Japan, Australia, and India.
Thousands of farmers are camping at various Delhi borders points against three laws enacted in September 2020 to liberalize domestic agricultural trade.
Getting global support is the key agenda of the protesting farmers. They believe that global support for a movement of this magnitude rests on mobilizing support at all levels.
Early in the movement, farm leader Darshan Pal had made a video appeal to the UN. Farm leaders say they command a lot of support among the Indian diaspora.
However, in February, the US had urged the Modi government to resolve its differences with the farmers vis-a-vis three farm laws. The US state department had issued a statement during the internet shutout at the protest sites.