Farmers’ group: Cast your ballot in the LS election, but not for the BJP
The main farmers’ organization in the districts of Hanumangarh and Sriganganagar, the Gramin Mazdoor Kisan Samiti (GKS), issued a plea on Tuesday to farmers and field workers to guarantee maximum voting for the first round of polling on April 19. The GKS, however, urged farmers to cast their ballots for any political party other than the BJP.
The Samyukt Kisan Morcha (SKM), which has been holding nationwide demonstrations on problems pertaining to farmers, is aligned with the GKS.
At a press conference today, GKS state president Ranjit Singh Raju, secretary Santvir Singh Mohanpura, president of Sriganganagar district Ram Kumar Saharan, secretary of Anoopgarh district Virdeep Singh, chief of Goluwala block Roshan Singh, and other officials stated that farmers had been agitating for their demands for the last three to four years and had tried every form and strategy of the movement.
On the other hand, this had no effect on the central BJP administration. On the day of Gurpurab, Prime Minister Narendra Modi made announcements and pledges to farmers, none of which had been kept. The GKS leaders said that this spurred farmers in Rajasthan to organize a pukka morcha in Ratanpura and Sangria.
Leaders of the farming community in the adjacent state of Punjab, which has elections on June 1, are also anticipated to contact the brotherhood.
GKS leaders said that farmers were now forced to resist the BJP. The representatives of the farmer group said that the state and federal governments of the Bharatiya Janata Party were feigning to buy crops at the minimum support price. According to government statistics, just 15% of mustard and moong were bought at MSP. Only because wheat and paddy needed to be supplied to the underprivileged via the Public Distribution System (PDS) did government organizations purchase them.
They said that the government had lowered mustard import duties to zero, making it less expensive to import mustard from outside. The farmers were not receiving the full price of mustard as a result.
The GKS state president said, “We have decided under the banner of SKM to oppose the saffron party candidates everywhere in the Lok Sabha elections as the BJP governments have been ignoring the demands of farmers and laborers.”
