Responding to road transport minister Nitin Gadkari's letter in which he had challenged her to a public debate, Sonia said, "I am amazed at (your) unabashed display of half-truths and misrepresentations. I should not, of course, be surprised because this is typical of your government when it runs out of logical and convincing arguments."
While rejecting the proposal for a debate, the six-page response gave a clause-by-clause counter to Gadkari's missive which had claimed that opponents of NDA's land law were anti-farmer. Gadkari has been named by PM Narendra Modi as the firefighter for the stalemated bill.
"It is regrettable that anyone championing the voice of distressed farmers and needy farm labourers is being branded 'anti-national' by a myopic Modi government bending over backwards to favour select industrialists," she said.
Sonia claimed the key difference between Congress and BJP was their understanding of farmers' distress arising out of acquisition sans safeguards, adding the clause for consent and social impact assessment were aimed to insulate farmers from whimsical acquisitions.
"It is now being widely recognized that your government is blatantly anti-farmer and anti-poor, compromising the rights of the weaker sections of society to benefit a handful of private parties," she said.
Slamming the charge that defence and national security projects would be mired in acquisition troubles because of consent and SIA provisions of UPA's law, Sonia said, "Section 40 of the 2013 Act specifically exempts defence and national security projects from both consent and SIA." She said electrification too was exempt from consent and SIA.
On the trouble posed to irrigation projects, the letter said, "The 2013 law specifically exempted irrigation projects from SIA (Section 4) when the environmental impact assessment had already been carried out."
"Your government's position on defence, irrigation and electrification issues is a blatant attempt to divert attention from your anti-farmer amendments," she said. Countering the claim that NDA had changed UPA's land law in the interest of development, she added, "Being pro-farmer does not mean anti-growth."
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