Farmers’groupplans 2day march
ON NOVEMBER 21 Lok Sangharsh Morcha plans to rally 20,000 farmers and tribals, set to march from Thane to Mumbai MUMBAI:
Maharashtra could witness yet another major farmers’ agitation before this year ends.
After nearly 40,000 farmers marched for six days from Nashik to Mumbai in March, the Lok Sangharsh Morcha (LSM) — another major rural workers’ front — is planning on a two-day farmers’ march from Thane to Mumbai this month, with several demands in hand: Implementation of the Swaminathan Committee Report, land rights for the tribal community, widening the scope of farm loan waivers and also compensation for farm labourers.
The LSM, which will organise the protest, said about 20,000 farmers will march from Thane to Somaiyya Ground on November 21.
Following a rally, they will proceed to march to south Mumbai’s Azad Maidan the next day and continue their protests until their demands are met.
Pratibha Shinde, general secretary of LSM, said the present state government has been insensitive to the plight of farmers and the tribal community.
“The tribals are denied any compensation as the lands they have cultivated for years are not in their names. The government, despite giving assurances in March, have hardly progressed on making them a reality. In addition, farmers are still At the meet in Mumbai, Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) chief, Sharad Pawar, called the current political scenario an “Emergency” and asked the Opposition parties to fight the BJP together.
Both the Congress and the
NCP, the state’s main opposition parties, agreed to draft a common minimum programme on agriculture to be adopted by them before the 2019 polls after the farmers’ group asked them to spell out how they would tackle the agrarian crisis. Widening the scope of the government’s farm loan waiver scheme