NANAR REFINERY ROW: Villagers meet Rahul Gandhi, get support
A delegation of villagers from Nanar village, Konkan, along with Congress leaders met Congress President Rahul Gandhi to seek support for their fight against acquiring land for the Rs 3 lakh crore petrochemical project.
The villagers, all farmers, told Gandhi that they are capable of working in their land and get good farm yields, instead of working as cheap labourer in an industry.
"We are owners of good fertile land. We do not want to sell it for a petrochemical project and work there as cheap labourer," a villager informed Gandhi.
Gandhi met them for halfan-hour and conveyed his concerns of acquiring fertile land for an industry when it can be set up anywhere else.
Echoing Gandhi's concern, former chief minister Ashok Chavan said, "Rahulji questioned the need to acquire fertile farming land when the industry can be established on some barren land."
One of the villagers gave Gandhi the example of another similar chemical plant that acquired huge tracts of mango farms. “Now that company exports mangoes depriving the farmers of their yield.”
The delegation led by AICC general secretary Mohan Prakash, president of Maharashtra Pradesh Congress Committee Ashok Chavan, MPCC spokesperson Sachin Sawant and leader of opposition in Assembly Radhakrishna Vikhe-Patil, appealed to Gandhi to visit the project and help them to get the project out of their village.
A Congress delegation led by Chavan will visit the vil-