Non-procurement of wheat sparks protests

Sushil Goyal

Tribune News Service

Sangrur, April 18

Hundreds of farmers, including a large number of women, staged a dharna outside the district administrative complex (DC office) here today. They were protesting against the non-procurement of wheat by government agencies in Sangrur district. The protesters were led by BKU (Ugrahan) state president Joginder Singh Ugrahan.

Farmers assembled at the local grain market and then marched towards the Deputy Commissioner’s office, raising slogans in support of their demand. They submitted a memorandum to the local Tehsildar, demanding immediate procurement of wheat.

Joginder Singh Ugrahan said the state government had been harassing farmers by not procuring wheat. Though farmers had been camping with their produce in the grain markets for the past several days, the government had turned a blind eye to their misery.

Due to non-procurement of wheat, small farmers were unable to give the contract amount to big farmers from whom they had taken land.

Farmer heads for Haryana mandi
Sangrur: Irked over non-procurement of wheat crop by government agencies over the past five days at Dirba grain market, 25 km from here, Jagmail Singh, a farmer from Rogla village (near Dirba) on Saturday moved to Haryana to sell his produce. Jagmail said he brought wheat from Rogla to Dirba Mandi five days ago, but no government agency had procured it till date. So, he got his produce loaded in a tractor-trailer to sell it in Haryana where auction of wheat by procurement agencies had already begun, he said.