Jayant slams BJP over proposed cane area policy
MEERUT: Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) vice-president Jayant Chaudha ry on Thursday said the state government’s proposal of a new cane area policy would be a disaster for lakhs of sugarcane farmers.
The policy will allegedly require that the farmers sell their produce to the sugar mill within their vicinity only and not to any other mill. Addressing farmers and party workers outside the divisional commissioner’s office on Thursday evening, Chaudhary said the farmers should understand that the cane area policy was the government’s ploy to benefit sugar mill owners.
“The new policy will deprive farmers from the option of selling their produce to mills of their choice,” he said.
Explaining the proposed policy, he said the mills would have a certain area to purchase the produce from farmers. “This means farmers will have to depend on the mills for procurement of their sugarcane while under the prevailing policy they are free to sell their produce to any mill of their choice,” Chaudhary said.
He said the policy would end competition among sugar mills and they would no longer announce attractive offers to attract farmers to sell their produce to them. “Their monopoly will eventually affect the minimum price of sugarcane,” he added. Chaudhary asked the farmers to unite and get ready to fight for their rights.
Coming down heavily on PM Narendra Modi, he said the PM opposed the Goods and Services Tax (GST) when he was the chief minister of Gujarat. “After taking over as the PM, he imposed much higher slabs under the GST which has ruined trade and employment in the country,” he said. Targeting the PM on demonetisation and GST, he claimed it had affected 15 lakh jobs. “According to FICCI, over 350 big corporates of the country will not generate new jobs in coming years due to the impact of demonetisation and GST,” he said.