Farmers’ union likely to march to House Nov 25

Following the post demo net is at ion farmers’ distress across the country, the Opposition-affiliated farmers’ unions have organised a march to the Parliament in November.

The march likely to be held on November 25 which will be joined by Raju Shetty of the Swabhimani Shetkari Sanghathana, who left the NDA protesting against non implementation of promises kept for farmers.

Beginning with Mandsaur and right up to Sikar in Rajasthan, the farmers have tried to target the BJP, both at the Centre and states. After this, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, UP and Rajasthan had announced farm loans waivers.

However, the farmers feel that loans waivers were not enough and were looking at largescale agrarian reforms, including the implementation of the M.S. Swaminathan committee report.

This recommends raising the Minimum Support Price (MSP) to at least 50 per cent more than the weighted average cost of production. It also called for large-scale farm reforms in the farming sector.

The organisations which would be the chief participants in this march are All-India Kisan Sabha, The Bhoomi Adhikar Andolan Samiti and Raju Shetty’s Swabhimani Shetkari Sanghathana apart from many apolitical farmers organisations. The farmers’ agitation had picked up steam from Mandsaur in MP where Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi had led the agitation. Recently in Rajastham, where Sikar was the ground zero of the protests, farmers had gathered at around 250 different locations in the region, blocking highways and inconveniencing locals and commuters, including crop loan waiver, purchase of crops at MSP, increasing farmers’ pension from Rs 500 to Rs 5,000, tackling the menace of stray cattle, removing the ban on the sale of cattle imposed by the state government.

◗ The march which will be joined by Raju Shetty of the Swabhimani Shetkari Sanghathana, who left the NDA protesting against non-implementation of promises kept for farmers