INLD, Cong walk out over farmers’ issues

CHANDIGARH:The opposition parties, INLD and Congress, staged a walkout in the Haryana assembly on Wednesday over “unsatisfactory reply” of agriculture minister OP Dhankar’s to a calling attention motion on the issue of minimum support prices (MSPs) of crops.

Decrying what they called indifferent attitude of the BJP government, INLD MLAs Parminder Dhull, Jaswinder Sandhu, Balwan Daulatpuria, Ranbir Gangwa and Omprakash Loharu, who brought the calling attention motion on the subject, said that while the land holding of the farmers was shrinking with every passing day, the government did nothing to help them.

They demanded implementation of Swaminathan commission report, setting up of farmers’ income commission, minimum support prices and purchase of bajra and solution to the problem of salinity faced by the famers.

Dhankar said in his reply that the state government had fixed the support price of sugarcane crop at Rs 320 for 2016- 17, which was the highest in the country.

He said the state government also provided subsidy to the farmers through implementation of centrally sponsored schemes and state schemes, subsidies on seeds, equipments, fertilisers and pesticides.

He said that Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana was being implemented in order to compensate the farmers for their losses due to natural calamities. Paddy, cotton, bajra, maize, barley, wheat, mustard and gram crops were covered under the scheme, he added. However, leader of Opposition Abhay Chautala and all other INLD MLAs, who sought specific replies to their questions staged a walkout, saying they were not satisfied with Dhankar’s replies. The Congress MLAs also followed suit.