Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) president Sukhbir Badal on Wednesday urged the Punjab Government to book those officers who are deliberately delaying the payments of farmers of their produce, especially the cane growers.
Sukhbir, speaking at a protest dharna organized by SAD’s Jalandhar district unit at Bhogpur, urged the Government to take over the private sugar mills to ensure timely cane crushing and payment to the cane grower farmers.
He alleged that Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh had been ignoring the interest of the farmers and even had not been giving time to the farmers to address their problems causing unrest and resentment among not only the cane growers but the whole farming community. Stating that Akali workers had already joined the farmer protest in Phagwara besides agitating themselves to ensure cane farmers got justice, Sukhbir said that the government should immediately release Rs 417 crore due to farmers along with interest. Sukhbir had also called an emergency meeting of the party’s core committee for Thursday to further intensify its ongoing agitation to force the Congress Government to increase SAP for sugarcane farmers to Rs 350 per quintal, disbursal of their pending dues of Rs 417 crore and immediate start of crushing in all sugar mills in the State. With the farmers announcing to end their protest late in the evening, there was no information regarding cancellation or postponement of the core group meeting till the filing of the report. Sukbir, in an official statement, said that never before had any government in the history of Punjab shown such insensitivity to farmers.
Bajwa should go to Rahul and not court to resolve sugarcane farmers’ problems: SAD SAD on Wednesday said that the Congress leaders are resorting to “dummy fight” over release of pending arrears of sugarcane farmers. Reacting to the threat of Punjab Congress Rajya Sabha MP Partap Singh Bajwa to his own government to move the Punjab and Haryana High Court if the farmers’ sugarcane arrears were not paid immediately, SAD senior vice-president Mahesh Inder Singh Grewal said that instead of issuing threats and going public, Bajwa should have persuaded Punjab Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh to do needful or urged his party president Rahul Gandhi to direct the State Government to get to business and help beleaguered farmers.
