More issues of distress to farmers and the government’s alleged indifference to their plight have come up during the ongoing ‘Khet Bachao Kisan Bachao’ (save farms, save farmers) yatra, which started from Nindar village, near here, on July 11 to highlight their sufferings. One of the issues identified in the villages relates to the agricultural power bills.
Yatra’s convenor Nagendra Singh Shekhawat said here on Monday that the march had so far covered more than 150 villages and found that the farmers were being forced to pay bills for agricultural power on a monthly basis. “This is an additional burden on farmers who are not getting fair prices for their crops,” Mr. Shekhawat said.
Farmers’ leaders participating in the yatra demanded that the bills for agricultural electricity connections be issued once in six months, coinciding with the crop cycle. Mr. Shekhawat said if the State government did not resolve the issue by August 20, the farmers would launch an agitation.
The farmers were not only being denied remunerative prices for their crops, vegetables and dairy products, but their land was also being acquired without consent, said Mr. Shekhawat. Moreover, there was no scheme for supply of water for irrigation in the entire Jaipur district which falls in the dark zone with a low groundwater level, he said.
“This is deliberately being done in order to convert agricultural farms into barren land, which may later be acquired for industrial units,” said Mr. Shekhawat.