Armoor, January 30: Telangana Pradesh Congress Committee (TPCC) Working President & MP A. Revanth Reddy slammed BJP and TRS Governments for their anti-farmer policies and announced that the Congress party would wage a battle to get justice for farmers, especially turmeric and jowar farmers of Telangana.
Revanth Reddy offered to make all arrangements if the turmeric farmers wish to hold a protest in the national capital at Jantar Mantar or any other place to pressurise the BJP Govt for the establishment of turmeric board.
He was addressing a massive public meeting at Armoor in Nizamabad district on Saturday. Senior leaders, including former minister & ex-Leader of Opposition in Legislative Council Mohammed Ali Shabbir, MLC T. Jeevan Reddy and other senior leaders also addressed the meeting.
He said farmers of Telangana, especially from Nizamabad, would gain from the establishment of turmeric board. He said Telangana farmers cultivate turmeric on nearly 1.30-1.50 lakh acres. Of this, nearly 45-50 acres get cultivated in Nizamabad. However, he said while a farmer invests about Rs. 1.50 lakh to cultivate turmeric on one acre, he earns only Rs. 1 lakh and therefore, he suffers huge losses. He said that the turmeric was being sold for about Rs. 4,000-4,500 per quintal. He said this price was almost Rs. 15,000 per quintal during the previous Congress regime.
Revanth Reddy said that the true abbreviation of BJP should be ‘Bharatiya Jhoota Party’. “There are three liars in the Telangana BJP who cheated the turmeric farmers of Nizamabad. The first liar is BJP National General Secretary Ram Madhav. He had promised to set up a Turmeric Board and MPS for Lal Jowar. However, after winning Lok Sabha elections, he vanished from the Telangana State. “The second liar is BJP State President Bandi Sanjay. Whenever farmers asks him about Haldi Board, he chants Hindu-Muslim rhetoric as if he was the only Hindu in Telangana. The third liar is MP D. Arvind. He had promised to resign from his post if he failed to get approval for Haldi Board in five days after the election. Even after two years, he neither got the board nor he resigned from his post,” he said.
The Congress MP said that both BJP and TRS were sides of the same coin. While both the parties enact the drama of rivalry, they cover up each other’s sins by raising questions about failures. He said that the BJP had promised to establish a turmeric board; provide MSP for Lal Jowar and turmeric and it also promised to launch Price Deficiency Scheme. However, he said none of these three things was done by the BJP Government for Nizamabad farmers and the TRS Govt never questioned BJP for these failures.
Addressing the meeting, Shabbir Ali demanded that the Chief Minister withdraw his decision to close down the procurement centres. “KCR had ordered the closure of IKP and other procurement centres citing new farm laws. Since the Supreme Court has stayed the implementation of new farm laws, the State Govt should order the restoration of all procurement centres,” he demanded while adding that the Congress party would not rest until the government gave every grain produced by the farmers.