Stop showing fake sympathy, cane farmers tell government

JALANDHAR: The protesting sugarcane farmers who are left with no option but to leave their families and come to hold dharnas have said if the government could not pay their dues which they had failed to get for their sugarcane crops even after a lapse of over an year, it should not keep bragging about the crop diversification scheme in speeches and also it (government) must stop showing ‘fake sympathy’ towards them.

Farmers hold a protest on the NH-1 in Phagwara. Malkiat Singh

Aakanksha N Bhardwaj

Tribune News Service

Jalandhar, December 5

The protesting sugarcane farmers who are left with no option but to leave their families and come to hold dharnas have said if the government could not pay their dues which they had failed to get for their sugarcane crops even after a lapse of over an year, it should not keep bragging about the crop diversification scheme in speeches and also it (government) must stop showing ‘fake sympathy’ towards them.

The farmers said the agrarian crisis was getting grimmer in the state. The issue was being deepened with every coming day.

Farmers have called off their strike after Kapurthala DC Mohammad Tayyabannounced that the government has decided to pay the dues of the farmers by January 15.

Satnam Singh, spokesperson for the Doaba Kisan Sangharsh Committee, said the government had said Rs 100 crore would immediately be released by sugar mills while the remaining amount would be given by January.

The farmers are demanding the due payment of Rs 400 crore from private and government sugar mills. Even a marginal farmer is waiting to get their amount, starting from Rs 15 lakh to Rs 25 lakh from the mills.

Waiting to repay loans

In the absence of the pending amount, the farmers are left with no option but to take loans from arhtiyas and banks to make both ends meet. They have taken loans amounting to lakhs and now, they are waiting for their payments by the mills so that they could repay their loans.

“As per average estimate, on Rs 25 lakh, the interest comes to around Rs 3 lakh per year. If this interest is added while calculating the cost, the price of the sugarcane being provided by the government will have to be recalculated.”

Satnam while protesting against the government said sugarcane was the only crop that was helping the state to get out of the vicious circle of paddy and wheat, but the present condition of the cane growers shows that the government hardly cared about the concept of crop diversification.

Not even sugarcane, but potato growers and those who are involved in the farming of mustard are also suffering through the same fate as they don’t get proper remuneration according to the input and hardwork they put in.