Ongole: Farmers seek guaranteed MSP
Farmers' leaders releasing a pamphlet on the importance of social forestry translated by Chunduri Ranga Rao in Ongole on Monday
Ongole: The farmers' leaders from various organisations in Prakasam district, working under the Samyukt Kisan Morcha, demanded the Union government to fulfil the promises made by Prime Minister Narendra Modi to persuade farmers' organisations to call off their protest in New Delhi last year. In a press meet here on Monday, they announced week-long protests and awareness programmes at the Assembly constituency and mandal levels, and a protest at the collectorate on April 18.
Speaking at the press meet, Chunduri Ranga Rao, the district convener of SKM, Pamidi Venkatarao of AP Rythu Sangham, Devarapalli Subba Reddy of Kisan Congress, Chunchu Seshaiah from Acharya Ranga Kisan Samstha, Kondragunta Venkaiah of Telugu Rythu, Lalithakumari of AP Rythu Coolie Sangham and N Nagaraju of Akhila Bharata Rythu Coolie Sangham explained that the cost of fuel, fertilisers, pesticides and seeds was increasing by day due to the corporate-friendly measures of the Prime Minister. They said that as Narendra Modi had failed to implement the promises made to the farmers to call off the long protest, the SKM had called for nationwide protests from April 11 to 18.
They informed that they are meeting the farmers and explaining the adverse effects of the decisions of the Union government in the coming week and organising local protests. On April 18, they would mobilise farmers from all over the district at the collectorate and demand the implementation of the promises.
They said that their demands include the guaranteed minimum support price as per the formula C2+50 per cent as proposed by the MS Swaminathan committee, cancellation of the amendments made to the Electricity Bill and provision of freedom from the indebtedness to the farmers.
Apart from these, the farmers' leaders are also demanding the implementation of the assured prices to the social forestry farmers, provision of good prices for milk being offered in Guntur and Krishna districts to the local dairy farmers, payment of compensation to the chilli farmers who lost the crop to the virus, halt to fixing of meters to the agriculture water pump sets.
The farmers' leaders also released a pamphlet published by Chunduri Ranga Rao after translating an editorial article 'Back to nature: Immense need for crop diversification and role of agroforestry' published in DownToEarth.org.in and The Hans India, into Telugu, to get the contents to reach to wider readers and farmers.