Farmers, arhtiyas, millers start ‘pucca morcha’ in Chandigarh

Farmers owing allegiance to the Samyukt Kisan Morcha (SKM), commission agents and rice millers of Punjab have decided to start a “pucca morcha” at Kisan Bhawan here, till their demand for proper procurement and post-procurement management of paddy are met. “Contained” by the police at Kisan Bhawan, the decision on meeting Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann will be taken by the protesting unions and associations on Saturday.

Hours ahead of their proposed protest march towards the CM’s residence here, the SKM representatives received an invite for talks from the office of Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann for Saturday evening.

It’s been 18 days since the official paddy procurement season began. Till date, the procurement remains tardy. Till Thursday evening, 16.49 lakh metric tonne (LMT) paddy had arrived in various mandis across the state, of which 14.81 LMT had been procured by the government agencies and private traders. However, only 1.86 LMT was lifted from the mandis, leading to a glut in almost all mandis of the state.

While millers have refused to mill the paddy till the Centre moved the previous years’ stock from godowns in Punjab, creating space for this year’s produce, the farmers have been at the receiving end as their paddy is not being purchased and they are forced to stay put in mandis.

The commission agents have been supporting farmers and rice millers and demanding that the commission being given to them till a few years ago (2.5 per cent) be restored.

So far, the anger of the three stakeholders in the food procurement business was directed at the Centre, as their demands were mostly from the Centre.

However, the detention of farmer leaders on the outskirts of Mohali and those who reached here being “forcibly contained in Kisan Bhawan”, as alleged by the SKM, has now drawn their ire against Punjab Government as well. As these farmers, coming from all over the state, started converging on Chandigarh, many leaders, including Balbir Singh Rajewal, Ruldu Singh Mansa, Manjit Singh Dhaner, Angrej Singh, Gurmeet Singh Mehma and Binder Singh Golewala, were apprehended on the outskirts of Mohali.

This infuriated the leaders of farmer unions, mandi labour unions, commission agents and rice millers. It was in the evening that most of their leaders were released and they reached Kisan Bhawan, where the Rapid Action Force was deployed to prevent them from coming out. “We will not return from here. We will decide on Saturday afternoon, if we should hold a meeting with the CM. Till then, we will make Kisan Bhawan our centre of protest,” said Raminder Singh, leader of the Kirti Kisan Morcha.