Though the government has been indicating it is open to changes in the proposed Land Bill, trouble for it mounted further on Wednesday with yet another NDA ally, the Lok Janshakti Party led by Union minister Ram Vilas Paswan, joining the group of those opposed to the law. As part of its renewed strategy, the government decided to field surface transport minister Nitin Gadkari to defend the proposed law. Sources said this move was taken after rural development minister Chaudhary Birendra Singh told Prime Minister Narendra Modi that his Lok Sabha constituency had a majority of farmers, and it would not be feasible for him to put the government’s stand before the media at a time when farmers’ bodies are protesting against the bill. The move to field Mr Gadkari was after a Cabinet meeting on the land acquisition bill issue that was presided over by Mr Modi in the morning. A relentless Congress, which is opposing the bill in both Houses of Parliament, hit the streets on Wednesday and accused the government of being “anti-farmer” and “pro-corporates”. Party leaders who staged a sit-in protest at Jantar Mantar vowed to take the battle across the nation, but Congress president Sonia Gandhi and vice-president Rahul Gandhi were conspicuous by their absence. Top Congress leaders like Digvijay Singh, Jairam Ramesh and Ahmed Patel present at the “Zameen Wapsi Andolan” dubbed as a “black ordinance” the emergency measure that made major changes in the UPA’s 2013 land law pushed by Mr Rahul Gandhi. The chorus against the land acquisition law within the NDA grew louder Wednesday with Ram Vilas Paswan’s LJP voicing concern over some provisions and seeking more clarity from the government. LJP MP Chirag Paswan said his party was worried over provisions like doing away with consent of farmers for acquiring their land in the amended law. “We have objections over some measures. There are questions about the need of doing away with farmers’ consent. They also will have no right to move the courts,” said Mr Paswan. Mr Gadkari, now the government’s key negotiator, has accused the Opposition parties of “double standards” and said almost every state government that was run by them, including the Congress, had written to the Centre against the previous land law brought in by the UPA. “We are open to accepting good suggestions offered by other parties. If people have some opinion on the social impact assessment or consent clauses, we are willing to hear them,” he told reporters. Asked about opposition by even the BJP’s allies, Mr Gadkari said it was a battle between ground realities and perceptions, adding that a perception against the government had been created even though the facts supported them. Attacking the Congress for its “double-faced” politics, he quoted former Maharashtra CM Prithviraj Chavan’s letter to the then UPA government against the law, in which he claimed it would “adversely” affect public works, and make them “unviable”. Insisting that the new law was pro-farmer and pro-poor, Mr Gadkari said two Central ministries, highways and coal, alone had awarded compensation of Rs 2,000 crores to landowners at the higher rate after the ordinance was promulgated. “Irrigation projects are behind 80 per cent of the land acquisition. Should such development works be hostage to the consent of 70 per cent landowners,” Mr Gadkari asked, adding that poor irrigation facilities across the country would further stress farmers under distress due to low productivity. Social activist Anna Hazare said, meanwhile, that the BJP government had “misled people” on several fronts, including the black money issue and decentralisation of power, while asking for votes in the run-up to the Lok Sabha elections. The Gandhian activist, who is agitating against the Land Bill, threatened to go ahead with a nationwide “jail bharo andolan” if the government does not pay heed to the demands.