Call session to save peasantry: Cong to CM

CHANDIGARH: The Punjab Congress on Wednesday urged chief minister Parkash Singh Badal to convene an emergency session of the Vidhan Sabha to introduce regulation of the rural credit system to bail farmers out of the debt trap that has been leading to their suicides.

“More than 10 suicides by debt- ridden far mers in the past 40 days, has once again brought to fore the monster of a crumbling agrarian economy of Punjab. As per reports, the farmers of the state are facing a colossal debt of over ` 78,000 crore, ` 43,000 crore of which is institutional and ` 35,000 crore outstanding towards arhtiyas or commission agents,” Khaira said in a statement here.

“The spate of suicides by farmers and mounting colossal agricultural debt of more than ` 78,000 crore show that the Badal government is not only anti-farmer but has also utterly failed to control the decline of agrarian economy of Punjab,” Khaira stated.

HT (May 14) had reported that the state government has been sitting on its own draft legislation for regulating the rural credit system by making the registration of private money lenders mandatory, besides setting up tehsil-level debt determination and settlement boards.

Khaira stated that although the SAD- BJP regime had set up a three-member committee to suggest measures to check farmers’ suicides in 2011, it never implemented even a single suggestion. “The Badal government has also failed to pay the meagre

` 2 lakh compensation to families of affected farmers; more than 2,240 such cases of compensation remain pending.”