BHUBANESWAR: The farmers under the banner of Naba Nirman Krushak Sangathan (NNKS) on Friday threatened to boycott the Assembly and General Elections in a bid to intensify their agitation over price, prestige and pension for Odisha farmers.

The Sangathan said its five lakh members and supporters will soon reach out to the people in villages across Odisha to encourage them to boycott voting if the Centre and State don’t take measures to hike the Minimum Support Price (MSP) for paddy and make provision for monthly pension to farmers.

“Our protest will be against the entire government machinery and system. Boycotting the election will be a part of the protest,” said NNKS president Akshay Kumar.“If required, we will also carry out rallies at district level to ask people to boycott voting and block polling booths in a non-violent and democratic way for fulfillment of our demand,” he added.

He said the farmers’ outfit will hold a meeting on March 13 and 14 to mobilise its members and supporters to seek support from people at village level across Odisha in this fight. “We will intensify our protest over price, prestige and pension for State farmers and will not fear any police atrocity and arrest,” said Kumar.
Convenor of the farmers’ outfit Seshadeb Nanda said, despite repeated requests, both Centre and State have failed to address their grievance. “Centre should immediately consider the demand for hike in paddy MSP from `1,750 to `2,930 and both the governments should make budgetary provision for monthly pension to state farmers,” said Nanda.

“If the State Government can spend over `40,000 crore for its employees who constitute less than one per cent of Odisha’s population, why it can’t spend `21,600 crore to give `5,000 monthly pension to farmers who constitute 70 per cent of the population,” the farmer leader said while seeking immediate implementation of the move.