Vijayapura: Fed up with the delay in the purchase of
tur dal through a
procurement centre, a few farmers from Devar Hipparagi village on Thursday staged a protest by throwing the dal on a road in the city.
Gururaj Gaded, who is a farmer and an ayurvedic doctor, brought 25 quintals of tur dal in a tractor on Thursday morning, and threw the produce on to the road near Dr Ambedkar Circle.
He told TOI, “The main reason I protested was though the government opened tur dal procurement centres in many places, corruption is rampant here. For each quintal of tur dal procured, the staff demands Rs 250.”
Gaded said his other demand was to increase the purchase quantity from each farmer. They had grown a lot more quantity of dal this year as the government had provided good irrigation facilities, but the meagre procurement amount had left them unhappy.
“I brought this to the notice of the district administration, but when the officials failed to show any concern, I took this step as the last resort, and threw the dal on the road,” Gaded said.
Meanwhile,
APMC secretary and nodal officer of tur dal procurement centres Mahadevappa Chabanur rushed to the spot and convinced the farmer about the government’s decision on procurement.
Chabanur clarified that the government will not increase the purchase quantity at any cost. “If there are any complaints of corruption, we will sort it out. As per the complaint, the procurement centre at Golageri village is cancelled, and notices have been issued for three other centres,” he said.
The official said, “In the 92 tur dal procurement centres in the district, 60,051 registered farmers benefited, of the total 78,607 farmers.”
The additional deputy commissioner arrived at the spot at 1.30pm and requested Gaded to withdraw the protest and told him the problem would be solved.
Gaded withdraw his four-hour protest. Akhand Karnataka Raitha Sangh state vice-president Aravind Kulkarni and several other farmers had joined the protest in support of Gaded.
Gururaj Gaded and other farmers on Thursday staged a protest in Vijayapura by throwing tur dal on the road in ... Read More
