Telangana Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leaders on Monday appealed to farmers and citizens at large not to support to the ‘sarkari bandh' and fall into the “political trap” of the Opposition parties on Tuesday.
“It is unfortunate that a State government has officially declared that it is supporting the bandh. I appeal to farmers not to mortgage their interests by believing the TRS and other Opposition parties on the propaganda unleashed against the three farm Acts cleared by the Parliament recently,” said Union Minister of State for Home G. Kishan Reddy.
Addressing a press conference in Delhi, the Minister said he is assuring farmers on behalf of the party and the Centre that “nothing will be done now or in the future to jeopardise the interests of the farmers.”
The three Acts were brought forth after discussions in various fora and it has been the demand of many agro-economists for years to benefit the farmers and remove the shackles imposed on them,
Turning to Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao, Mr. Reddy questioned why he is shifting the blame onto the Centre for every problem, including being unable to even purchase fine rice, which he had forced the farmers to grow but is not even bothered about procuring.
“The Centre has been consistently buying the farm produce of many crops from various procurement centres across Telangana,” he said.
National OBC chairman K. Laxman charged the Chief Minister of “shedding crocodile tears” for farmers as the TRS government had never implemented the loan waiver properly and farmers were even lathicharged for seeking the minimum support price. The farm Acts brought out by the Centre is only meant to allow farmers to sell their produce wherever they wished to and there is no truth in abolition of market yards of the MSP, he said.
Vice-president D.K. Aruna criticised the TRS government for supporting the bandh call and pointed out that in the last six years not a single protest was allowed in the State and Mr. Rao was not even ready to receive a single representation from any aggrieved section.
Party president Bandi Sanjay Kumar said TRS aligning with the Congress in this agitation only exposes its “political bankruptcy.” If the State government is serious about tackling farmers issues, it should first implement the Central welfare schemes for them like insurance, farm mechanisation, soil testing, micro-irrigation etc. besides abolishing the current market committees, and establish farmers panels.
