{"id":44310,"date":"2018-06-01T17:30:40","date_gmt":"2018-06-01T12:00:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/apnlive.com\/?p=44310"},"modified":"2018-06-01T17:31:23","modified_gmt":"2018-06-01T12:01:23","slug":"farmers-protests-sure-to-impact-coming-elections","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/apnlive.com\/special-tv-shows\/apn-mudda-show\/farmers-protests-sure-to-impact-coming-elections\/","title":{"rendered":"Farmers\u2019 protests sure to impact coming elections"},"content":{"rendered":"

Mudda discusses nationwide stir, its causes and ways to resolve the crisis, speaker wonders if discontent impacted results in Kairana<\/em><\/p>\n

Friday\u2019s edition of Mudda discussed the nationwide farmers\u2019 protests which is to commence from June 1<\/p>\n

The show was anchored by Anant Tyagi. The panellists were Rakesh Singh from BJP, Kisan Shakti Sangh President Chaudhary Pushpendra Singh, economist Sharad Kohli, Congress spokesperson Raju Waghmare and APN Consulting Editor Govind Pant Raju.<\/p>\n

At a time when the BJP had not recovered from the shock of the election results of 4 Lok Sabha and 10 Vidhan Sabha seats, comes another shock for the ruling party\u2014the farmers<\/a> of the country have decided to go on a ten-day protest from June 1 to June 10. The protests would be conducted in seven states with the Rashtriya Kisan Mahasangh\u2014a group of 130 farmers\u2019 organisation going on strike. Madhya Pradesh would be the centre of the agitation with protests being conducted in 10 places in the state, four places in Haryana, eight in Maharashtra, two in Karnataka, one each in Kerala and Jammu & Kashmir.<\/p>\n

The protests are likely to affect the supply of milk, fruits and vegetables. The farmers are demanding for a complete nation-wide loan waiver, ensured income for small farmers, apt minimum support price for milk, fruits vegetables and other produces. The ten-day protest would be divided into phases. The first phase would include paying tribute to the farmers on June 6, who died in the police firing in Mandsaur district of Madhya Pradesh last year.\u00a0\u00a0In the second phase, June 8^{th<\/sup>\u00a0will be observed as Kisan Asahyog Diwas and in the third phase farmers will call for a nationwide strike till 2 pm on June 10.<\/p>\n}

Chaudhary Pushpendra Singh explained the reasons behind the farmers\u2019 agitation. Farmers not getting fair price for their produce was the main reason behind the protests, said Singh. He said that the farmers had no complaints with the consumers in cities as they were buying the produces at ten times their actual rate but the whole crisis was due to the middlemen\u2014 a problem which no government has been able to tackle in the past 70 years. \u201cMoreover, this government had promised in their 2014 manifesto that they will set the MSP at 1.50 times the cost of the produce. This promise was not delivered and the economic survey released last year revealed that the income of the farmers has not increased in the past 4 years because of which the farmers are in debt,\u201d said Singh.<\/p>\n

Rakesh Singh alleged that although it was the farmers\u2019 right to protest peacefully but many a times, the Opposition parties took mileage from such protests. He said that the farmers\u2019 long march that took place in March was also a politically motivated agitation as the protest was called off in a day. He also said that the Mandsaur violence was a result of the Opposition\u2019s interference.<\/p>\n

To this Pushpendra Singh replied that the Opposition took advantage from the protest because BJP did not pay attention to the farmers\u2019 demands. \u201cThe farmers wouldn\u2019t have protested at the first place if the demands would have been met earlier,\u201d said Singh.<\/p>\n

Congress spokesperson said that it is due to the wrong policies of the government that the farmers are in distress. \u201cThere is surplus production but despite there being surplus produce, the government chose to import agro produces and it also reduced the import duty to zero, such policies are certain to backfire,\u201d said Raju Waghmare.<\/p>\n

\u2014Compiled by Lilly Paul<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"