Farmers protest, send demand charter to PM

Chandigarh, April 15

The BKU (Ekta Ugrahan) on Friday staged protests at six places, including Sangrur, Muktsar, Fazilka and Hoshiarpur districts, in the state and sent a demand charter to the Prime Minister, a press release said here.

BKU (Ekta Ugrahan) general secretary Sukhdev Singh Kokri Kalan condemned the Centre for backtracking on its promise to provide legal guarantee for the procurement of all crops on the MSP. In a memorandum sent to the PM, they demanded the Centre should enact a law fixing the government responsibility for the procurement of all crops.

As per the recommendations of the Swaminathan Commission and the Ramesh Chandra Committee, calculate the total costs and fix the MSP of all crops according to C-2+ 50% formula.

They further demanded the report of the Swaminathan Commission should be implemented; the government exchequer should be opened up to provide remunerative prices of crops to farmers; hefty taxes should be imposed on multinationals. It was also demanded the government should announce a bonus of Rs 300 per quintal to farmers to offset the losses incurred due to unseasonal rains and increase in temperature. —