Telangana BJP president and Karimnagar MP Bandi Sanjay Kumar is to take up protest fast at the State party office from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Thursday to highlight the government’s bid to “force the farmers to give up paddy cultivation”.
General secretary G. Premender Reddy announced in a statement on Wednesday that the party president has decided to take up the ‘deeksha’ to convey a message to the farming community that the party will stand by them and put pressure on the government to take a step back. Taking strong objection to the government ‘browbeating’ the farmers to prevent them from raising paddy, he said it was not fair to terrorise them against taking up age old farm practices.
TRS government had no business to talk of paddy cultivation since it is the Centre which procures the crop and in any case, the farmers should be convinced to take alternate crops by providing them with necessary inputs through proper awareness programmes and certainly not by scare mongering, he added.
Earlier, addressing a press conference at Huzurabad, Mr. Sanjay Kumar accused the TRS of spending ₹20,000 per vote but claimed that the people have decided to give a clear victory to former minister E. Rajender. “Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao is worried about this bypoll outcome so he has been trying every means to win but he will not succeed. He has no face to show here and has been blaming the Election Commission (EC) for not holding a public meeting,” he charged.
The BJP chief flayed the ruling party for running a fake campaign that his party had stopped ‘Dalit Bandhu’ and remarked TRS had dug its own grave. “People are wise enough to decide between ‘Vari’ and ‘Vuri’ - ‘paddy’ is vote for BJP or ‘hanging’ is a vote for TRS. CM and some collectors are acting like ‘Taliban’ threatening to shut shops selling paddy seeds, who gave them this kind of indiscriminate power where they talk of disregarding Supreme Court and High Court,” he questioned.
There is a pact between Centre and TS on purchase of paddy — 95 lakh tonnes in Yasangi and 60 lakh tonnes in next season. “The Centre through Food Corporation of India (FCI) gives minimum support price and pays for labour, transport, storage and other charges so what is this government problem? Farmers need not worry as we will ensure the Centre will do paddy procurement in full,” claimed the BJP president.
