DW BUREAU / chandigarh Shiromani Akali Dal president Sardar Sukhbir Singh Badal said here today that demanded that the anti farmers and pro-corporate provisions of the APMC Act 2017 enacted by the Amarrinder-led Congress government must be scrapped in a special Vidhan Sabha session. Commenting on the Chief Minister Captain Amaridner Singh's statement on the convening of the assembly session, Mr Badal said that the CM's U-turn on the session "is a decisive first victory of the Shiromani Akali Dal and the farmers organizations. This was one of the major objectives of the massive Kisan Ros March organized by the party on October 1, along with the annulment of the center's three Acts on farm marketing. Badal recalled how Captain Amarinder Singh had ridiculed the Akali demand saying that this was no solution to the problem. "But seeing the intensity of the Punjabis', especially the farmers' rage during the October 1 Akali Ros March and in the protests of the farmers' organizations, Amarinder has felt compelled to take this U-turn and to agree to convene a session," said Badal in a statement here this evening. "Scrapping of the provisions of the anti farmer 2017 APMC act as well as declaring the whole of the state of Punjab as notified Mandi, or Principal Market Area, have been the consistent demands of the SAD while urging the state govt to convene a special session of the state assembly," added Badal. The Akali supremo however added that though the center's Acts must be rejected by the state assembly," yet a mere rejection of these Acts would have no practical implication or utility for the farmers if the state is not declared an agricultural market and also if the 2017 APMC Act continues to remain in force in the state. "The only way to render the center's legislation redundant and un-implementable in Punjab is to put the whole of the state beyond the purview of the central Acts by declaring the whole of the state a Principal Market Area or notified Mandi because those Acts are not applicable in areas declared as markets by a state government," said Badal. Meanwhile, the Youth Akali Dal (YAD) said it would take the families of Punjab farmers who committed suicide to Rahul Gandhi's residence in Delhi to force him to listen to their plight after the Congress leader refused to meet the families during the course of his tractor rally in Patiala. "It is shameful that Rahul refused to meet the worst affected farmers of Punjab for whom he is ostensibly taking out the tractor yatra," YAD President Parambans Singh Romana said. Romana said such families have tried to approach the chief minister, the finance minister and now Rahul Gandhi, but have been "snubbed by all of them." The three-day Punjab 'Kheti Bachao Yatra' of Congress MP Rahul Gandhi and Chief Minister Amarinder Singh culminated on Tuesday at the border along Haryana, with a vow by the two leaders to not budge even an inch from their principled stand in support of the favours, who were "under attack by the Centre's draconian farm laws." Before entering Haryana for a one-day tour, at a public rally at Francewala village near Sanaur in Patiala district, the final point of the tractor rally of the Congress leaders, including AICC General Secretary Harish Rawat and state party President Sunil Jakhar, Rahul lashed out at the BJP-led government at the Centre for inflicting atrocities upon atrocities on the people of all sections in the past six years. (editor@dailyworld.in)