Chhavi Bhatia

New Delhi— In what appears to be a major faux pas by the publicity team of the Punjab BJP, the poster boy of its latest promotional post on benefits of the contentious farm laws, is a Punjabi actor opposing them at Singhu for almost a month now. The post propagating how the new laws are “farmer friendly” was put up on the official Facebook page of Bharatiya Janata Party’s state wing—BJP Punjab, on December 21. The post has since been taken down after the ‘farmer’ identified as Harpreet Singh called them out on his social media platforms.

Written in Punjabi, Hindi and English, the FB post followed the government’s line of thought on farmers being “misled” and how government agencies had “procured paddy worth Rs 77957.83 crore” till now. The content further promotes the government as farmer friendly, particularly Punjab, saying “49 per cent share (of this procurement) is of Punjab”. The post carried a photograph of a farmer, smiling broadly as symbolic of endorsing the government’s stand.

Singh was shocked to find himself as the poster boy of something he has been vehemently opposing. In a tweet dated December 22, he made his anger heard. “Someone please tell them that this person is sitting at Singhu”, he tweeted, adding “BJP’s shamelessness is like unlimited internet offered by Jio”. The 36-year-old actor-director who hails from Hoshiarpur, is famously known as Harp Farmer. To further assert that his loyalties lie with farmers, Singh put up a photograph sitting with farmers at Tikri captioned, “Born farmer, Lost in Film Fair, and I always stand with My Farmers(sic).”