Mohali, February 16
The efforts of the Third Front to lure Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal away from the BJP-led NDA became evident today when Narendra Singh, Agriculture Minister, Bihar, said Badal should unfurl the national flag at the Red Fort as the next Prime Minister.

Narendra Singh is representing Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar at the Progressive Punjab Agriculture Summit. Janata Dal-United (JD-U) recently walked out of the BJP-led NDA due to Nitish’s differences over BJP’s decision to project Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi as PM nominee.

Now, the JD(U), along with other parties, is to trying to form a non-Congress, non-BJP Third Front. Narendra Singh said that farmers across the country want a farmer leader like Badal to be the country’s Prime Minister. “As Badal is the senior-most politician in the country, he should be the next PM. Going by his dedication to the cause and his concern for farmers, the people of Bihar want the son of a farmer (Badal) to lead the country.” Though the other Chief Ministers present did not project him as the next Prime Minister, they showered praise on Badal as a leader of farmers.

Blaming the Congress-led Centre for having ignored the needs of farmers, they asked Badal to lead the path and help protect the interests of the farming community. Chandrababu Naidu, former Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh, said “Since Independence, agriculture has never been top priority with the Centre. Farmers are the biggest sufferers because there is no pricing mechanism for fruits and vegetables.

“All political parties need to sink their differences and get together on a forum — like the one provided by Parkash Singh Badal — to save the farmers of our country,” he said. Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Chauhan said, “We need a leader who understands farmers and not mere planners who sit in their offices without knowing the ground reality.

“When I went to the Centre to seek compensation for farmers whose crop was destroyed by frost bite, I was shocked to learn that no such category of crop loss is mentioned in the official list. We need leaders like Badal who can identify with the farmers.”

Raman Singh, Chief Minister, Chhattisgarh, said, “We need a leader who believes that farmers must get 50 per cent profit share in the crop price. We need to talk about better storage facilities for vegetables and other yields, besides agro-processing.”

Addressing the conference, Badal said, “We want this conference to be a non-political one and had invited Chief Ministers of all the states.” After talking about different aspects of farming like poor crop pricing, inadequate storage facilities, absence of food-processing industry, he said, “Farmers are sleeping tigers. If they wake up, the government will have to bear the responsibility for the collapse in the law-and-order situation.” Badal batted for a separate Union budget on agriculture. He said, “I will conclude by saying: Save the farmer and save the country.”