Farmers Movement Archive

After Kurukshetra rally, farmers to march till Parliament

Jind: A day after organising a farmers’ rally at Kurukshetra which was attended by thousands of farmers from across Haryana, Bhartiya Kisan Union (BKU) announced a march till Parliament during the upcoming monsoon session, which starts from September 14. Fifty farmers each from Haryana, Punjab and Uttar Pradesh will carry out the march to raise their issues, including their opposition to three agriculture-related ordinances brought in by the Centre. The decision was taken at a meeting in Jind on Friday. Farmers even sent 500 letters to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, demanding MSP on crops and timely payments instead of company rule. The BKU also set a target to send 5 lakh such postal letters from the state. Earlier, several farmers held a protest march on Friday till the post office and raised slogans against Haryana chief minister Manohar Lal Khattar and Modi. Ramphal Kandela, BKU national vice-president, said, “We strongly condemned the police action on farmers in Kurukshetra and decided to march till the Parliament. We will demand a law to include MSP and timely payment provision in the ordinance.” “The government has failed to win the trust and make farmers understand these issues. Who will be responsible for payment of crops if the private company runs away after procurement and what is the guarantee that companies will not cheat farmers by purchasing crops below the MSP? The present government is trying to stop the farmers from raising issues citing the pandemic, but farmers won’t take a step back and would launch an agitation even if police book us for violating corona norms,” he added. Farmers launched an attack against newly-appointed BJP state president O P Dhankar, saying that he was the one who used to hold half naked protests to raise farmers’ issues and was now misleading them by counting the benefits of three ordinances. These leaders formed the government on the pretext of helping farmers, but cheated us, they said.

The Times of India

2020-09-12

Chandigarh