Chhavi Bhatia
New Delhi—It wasn’t until he received a call from a friend that Harp Farmer aka Harpeet Singh knew he was the poster boy of BJP’s propaganda in favour of the contentious farm laws. Much to his chagrin. “I was livid when I saw the post. I have been raising my voice against these anti-farmer laws and here was the Bharatiya Janata Party showing me as a happy, contented farmer,” said Harp when The Financial World spoke to him.
The post in question was promotional material as part of the BJP’s publicity overdrive to “dispel myths” about the new farm laws that have been at the centre of almost a month long peaceful sit-ins by lakhs of farmers outside Delhi. The official page of Punjab BJP had shared the post on its Facebook on December 21 with the photograph of a beaming Harp who is an actor-director. It was, however, later taken down after Harp flagged it and it caused furore on social media. “The PR team must have searched for pictures of happy farmers and took the first picture that showed up as a result. And they simply went ahead and used it without bothering to verify who the person is or what he is up to these days,” the 36-year-old said. The photo was clicked in 2014 by the son of renowned author Dr Surjit Singh Patar as part of his art work.
Being an actor and a model, his photos are easily available on the internet, which he claims are regularly used for ads, posters. “I generally let it slide when people use my photograph without permission but in no way I could have ignored this case. I am sitting in solidarity with my farmer brothers, protesting against the new farm laws and the BJP shows me as a pro-voice!,” Harp complained.
“What irked me more was the content saying farmers are misled. Hundred farmers can be misled, thousand at maximum. Can lakhs upon lakhs of farmers be misled? There must be something seriously wrong with the new laws that there is so much clamour against it,” he further says, adding that everyone is resolved to not go back without getting the laws repealed. Himself a farmer, Harp has been camping with hundreds of thousands of his counterparts at Singhu since November 26.
Harp’s legal team has sent a defamation notice to the BJP and he plans to send another on “violation of human rights”. “It is often said that any publicity is good publicity. Not when it is against what you stand for and what you are,” he said philosophically on a signing note.
