{"id":147730,"date":"2021-07-23T12:01:07","date_gmt":"2021-07-23T06:31:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/apnlive.com\/?p=147730"},"modified":"2021-07-23T14:02:50","modified_gmt":"2021-07-23T08:32:50","slug":"meenakshi-lekhi-apologies-remarks-on-farmers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/apnlive.com\/india-news\/meenakshi-lekhi-apologies-remarks-on-farmers\/","title":{"rendered":"Meenakshi Lekhi apologises for her remarks on farmers, says her statement was misinterpreted"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Union Minister Meenakshi Lekhi on Thursday apologized for her remarks on farmers protesting at Jantar Mantar on Thursday. She said that her statement on the attack on media person during farmers&#8217; Parliament at Jantar Mantar was misinterpreted. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Referring to the protesting farmers, Lekhi had said they are hooligans, not farmers. These are criminal acts. What happened on January 26 was also shameful criminals activities. Opposition promoted such activities, she added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-twitter wp-block-embed-twitter\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\"><p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">They are not farmers, they are hooligans&#8230; These are criminal acts. What happened on January 26 was also shameful criminals activities. Opposition promoted such activities: Union Minister Meenakshi Lekhi on alleged attack on a media person at &#39;Farmers&#39; Parliament&#39; today <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/72OARBh1n0\">pic.twitter.com\/72OARBh1n0<\/a><\/p>&mdash; ANI (@ANI) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/ANI\/status\/1418169585954553856?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">July 22, 2021<\/a><\/blockquote><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>A senior video journalist of a leading media channel was allegedly attacked during the protest organized by farmers against the three farm laws at Jantar Mantar in Delhi.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>However, in her defense, Lekhi said during a press conference that her comment was sought on the Red Fort violence on January 26 and the attack on a media person (at Farmers&#8217; Parliament). In response, I said only hooligans, not farmers can indulge in such activities,&#8221; the newly inducted Union Minister of State for External Affairs said Thursday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>My words have been distorted, if it has hurt farmers or anyone else, then I apologize and take back my words,&#8221; the minister told news agency ANI.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Bharatiya Kisan Union (BKU) leader Rakesh Tikait took cognizance of the comment and said that farmers are &#8220;<em>annadata<\/em>s&#8221; (providers of food) and not &#8220;hooligans&#8221;.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Hooligans are those who have nothing. It is wrong to make such remarks for farmers. We are farmers, not hooligans. Farmers are &#8216;anndatas&#8217; of the land,&#8221; Tikait said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-twitter wp-block-embed-twitter\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\"><p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Hooligans are the ones who have nothing. It is wrong to make such remarks for farmers. We are farmers, not hooligans. Farmers are &#39;anndatas&#39; of the land: Rakesh Tikait, BKU leader, on Mos MEA Meenakashi Lekhi&#39;s comment <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/ywMVap5jg7\">pic.twitter.com\/ywMVap5jg7<\/a><\/p>&mdash; ANI (@ANI) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/ANI\/status\/1418177434461958150?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">July 22, 2021<\/a><\/blockquote><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Delhi Police had permitted the farmers to hold a protest at Jantar Mantar on Wednesday, subject to following all Covid-19 guidelines.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Permission was granted to limited numbers not exceeding 200 persons for Samyukt Kisan Morcha (SKM) and six persons for Kisan Mazdoor Sangharsh Committee (KMSC) from 11 am upto 5 pm daily.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Farmers have been protesting on the different borders of the national capital since November 26 last year against the three newly enacted farm laws: Farmers\u2019 Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Act, 2020; the Farmers Empowerment and Protection) Agreement on Price Assurance and farm Services Act 2020 and the Essential Commodities (Amendment) Act, 2020.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The government has projected the new laws as major reforms in the agriculture sector that will remove the mandi system and middlemen and allow farmers to sell their produce anywhere in the country. However, the protesting farmers argue that the new laws have no mention of minimum support price (MSP) and the mandis that will leave them at the mercy of big corporates.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Read Also: <a href=\"https:\/\/apnlive.com\/delhi-man-south-asian-women-nude-photos\/\" data-type=\"URL\" data-id=\"https:\/\/apnlive.com\/delhi-man-south-asian-women-nude-photos\/\">Delhi man arrested for blackmailing women with nude pics, videos<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In other India news, <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/apnlive.com\/bs-yediyurappa-may-not-remain-as-karnataka-cm-july-26\/\" target=\"_blank\">Karnataka Chief Minister BS Yediyurappa<\/a>, who strongly denied the reports of resignation, on Thursday said he is not sure if he will continue as the chief minister after July 26<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-4-3 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"&#039;\u0911\u0915\u094d\u0938\u0940\u091c\u0928 \u0915\u0940 \u0915\u092e\u0940 \u0928\u0947 \u0928\u0939\u0940\u0902 \u092e\u093e\u0930\u093e&#039; \u0935\u093e\u0932\u0947 \u0938\u0930\u0915\u093e\u0930 \u0915\u0947 \u092c\u092f\u093e\u0928 \u0938\u0947 \u091a\u0922\u093c\u093e \u0935\u093f\u092a\u0915\u094d\u0937 \u0915\u093e \u092a\u093e\u0930\u093e |  Medical oxygen crisis\" width=\"740\" height=\"555\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/V-duYXn6dy8?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Referring to the protesting farmers, Lekhi had said they are hooligans, not farmers. These are criminal acts. What happened on January 26 was also shameful criminals activities. Opposition promoted such activities, she added.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":147754,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_eb_attr":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true},"categories":[1497],"tags":[7601,103688,1862,43546],"yst_prominent_words":[43543,21715,3811,24227,5081,36915,88048,43542,24228,3688,7598,3985,8494,10196],"ppma_author":[140543],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/d2r2ijn7njrktv.cloudfront.net\/apnlive\/uploads\/2021\/07\/23115840\/Meenakshi-Lekhi.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"authors":[{"term_id":140543,"user_id":4,"is_guest":0,"slug":"apnnewsdesk","display_name":"APN Live","avatar_url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/478eacb893eda88aa6ed8d99b005bf58?s=96&r=g"}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/apnlive.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/147730"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/apnlive.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/apnlive.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apnlive.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apnlive.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=147730"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/apnlive.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/147730\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apnlive.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/147754"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/apnlive.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=147730"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apnlive.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=147730"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apnlive.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=147730"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apnlive.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=147730"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apnlive.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/ppma_author?post=147730"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<!-- html is corrupted -->