Ex-serviceman-turned farmer to return award

PK Jaiswar

Tribune News Service

Amritsar, December 10

Perturbed over the indifferent attitude of the PM Narendra Modi-led NDA government towards farmers who had been protesting in Delhi against the three agri laws, national award winning farmer, Major Manmohan Singh Verka (retd), threatened to return his award.

Verka had been conferred three awards in horticulture. He is the only person from Punjab, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir and Uttarakhand to get three awards. An ex-serviceman-turned-farmer, Verka said, he along with several other national award winners would soon return the award to the Union Agriculture Minister.

“It is very disturbing that the farming community has to hit the roads for their survival while the Centre has adopted an adamant attitude towards their demand of scrapping the three agri laws,” he said. Verka said the government should immediately announce withdrawal of these newly enacted laws, which would help the corporate houses.

“I talked to the national award winning farmers in the region. We have decided to return the awards,” he said.

After a service of 21 years in the Indian Army, Verka took premature retirement in 1990, but started full-time farming only in 1998.

Right from the beginning, he was been inclined towards horticulture. He grew orchard on 25 acres and since then there has been no looking back for him.