Farmers Movement Archive

Revanth’s padayatra to end on February 16

The 10-day padayatra of Telangana Congress working president and Malkajgiri MP A. Revanth Reddy will conclude on February 16 at Raviryala on the city outskirts with a massive public meeting. The padayatra started from Achampet opposing the three farm bills and with an intention to sensitise farmers on how they would be detrimental to their interests in the long run. Speaking to reporters at Amangal on the 7th day of his walkathon on Saturday, Mr. Reddy said farmers were realising how dangerous the laws were and wondering why Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao had backtracked after criticising the same. “I have understood the apprehensions of the farmers who had expressed their fears during my seven days of interaction with hundreds of them,” he said. Terming the laws as ‘black laws’, he said that Prime Minister Narendra Modi had decided to turn farmers into farm labourers in their own land just to help his crony capitalists. Mr. Reddy said with the laws coming into effect, all procurement centres would be closed, market yards would fade away, farmers cannot go to the courts if they are cheated by the contractors and even the ration shops will be closed. “Farmers want to do farming but these laws want them to do business, which is impossible,” he said. Stating that only Congress was a farmer-friendly party, he reminded that Congress had distributed land to the land-less farmers. Congress enacted stringent laws to ensure that farmers were not cheated. Even the Minimum Support Price (MSP) concept was introduced to see farmers get their due for their hard work. Farm loan waiver, free power, subsidised seeds and farm inputs were given by all the Congress governments. For the landless poor, the MNREGA scheme was launched assuring 100 days of work. But all those benefits are now being snatched away by two Gujaratis to help Ambani and Adani, he said, referring to Prime Minister Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah. KCR’s silence The Congress MP attributed the silence of Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao to the secret understanding between the BJP and TRS. “KCR is silent as he is afraid that his corruption will be exposed if he doesn’t toe BJP’s line,” he alleged. Farmers’ flags Mr. Reddy said it was the responsibility of everyone irrespective of party affiliation to hold the farmers’ flag to extend their support for the food suppliers of the nation. “There are no elections now. So let us hold farmers’ flag along with the party flag.” Replying to a question, he ridiculed KCR saying he doesn’t believe in supporting farmers when they are alive but only after they die. He said the AICC had backed his padayatra that will conclude on February 16 with a huge tractors’ rally. He appealed to all people connected with farmers and farming directly or indirectly to attend the meeting to extend their support.

The Hindu

2021-02-14

Hyderabad,TELANGANA