Farmers Movement Archive

Aligarh farmers stage protest, demand new sugar mill promised by BJP in 2019

AGRA: Two days ahead of the Prime Minister’s visit to Aligarh, more than 1,500 farmers staged a protest on Sunday to demand fulfilment of the BJP government’s four-year-old promise of setting up a new sugar mill in the district. The farmers also threatened to vote against the party in the upcoming assembly election if their demand was not fulfilled. Stopped by police when they were on the way to meet UP minister for sugar industry and cane development minister Suresh Rana who happened to be in the city, the farmers sat on the road, shouting slogans like “jo kisan ke hit ki baat karega.. wahi desh par raj karega” (Only those who talk in favour of farmers will rule the country) and held up placards, saying, “Naye chini mill nahi to 2022 me vote nahi” (No vote in 2022 elections if the new sugar mill is not set up). State general secretary of the Bhartiya Kisan Union (Bhanu) Shailendra Pal Singh told TOI that they had invited all legislators along with the MP and district administration officials to join the kisan panchayat in Jawan area, near old sugar mill — Satna Kasimpur. The panchayat was organized to question them about the efforts they made in the last 4.5 years for fulfilling the promise of setting up a new sugar mill. However, only Barauli MLA, Dalveer Singh, turned up and claimed that he had raised this issue several times in the assembly. He claimed that efforts were being made to fulfil the promise. As Rana was in town, the panchayat decided to call on him. “When we were heading to meet the minister, police stopped us at various locations and did not allow us to meet him,” Singh said, adding that they forced them to sit on a road and protest. “We did not create any ruckus and were peacefully heading to the circuit house,” he added. The farmers’ leader said the “government had assured us of a new sugar mill in 2019 Lok Sabha elections but till date, nothing has been done. The 52-year-old sugar mill is non-functional and we had lodged a formal complaint to officials concerned but to no avail”. According to farmers, sugarcane was sown across 9,336 hectares in Aligarh in 2015-16 but now, the area has shrunk to 4,500 hectares due to the defunct sugar mill in the district. The other sugar mills are at least 100 kilometres away from the district and transporting produce there is expensive, they added.

The Times of India

2021-09-13

Agra