Chandigarh, April 30: Indian National Lok Dal (INLD) has condemned the Government of India decision to impose duty of Rs 8,000 per tonne on the export of basmati rice.INLD state president Mr Ashok Arora has demanded immediate withdrawal of the Finance Minister’s announcement. INLD has also threatened to launch peasant’s agitation on the issue.
In a press statement issued here today, Mr Arora said that INLD would not pull back from making any sacrifice on the issue. He said that this decision to impose export duty would adversely affect the farmers as the 98% of the basmati is exported, while only 2% basmati is used in the country. This would not have any effect on the inflation as only very small part of the basmati rice is used in the country, he added.
INLD leader said that this announcement has once again proved the anti farmer attitude of the Congress party. He said that farmers would suffer huge loss and the market price of farmer’s produce of basmati would come down to Rs 500-600 per quintal and the farmer would be ruined.
Mr Arora said that government has totally failed to curb the rising prices but it was now crushing the poor farming community in the guise of inflation. The government is paying far less prices to the farmers than the international & national market prices for their produce. It has no right to put farmers at a disadvantageous position and unfair trade practice, he further added.
Mr Arora said that the government has also adopted the unfair practices & policies for the farmers earlier also as when the farmer was selling the basmati produce, the ban on export was imposed but after three weeks when the same basmati produce reached the big exporter houses, the ban on export was lifted. This whole exercise benefited the big exporters, while the farmers suffered huge losses.
INLD leader said that this year also, the ban on selling the wheat to the private traders was imposed, which has forced the farming community to sell the wheat produce far below the market prices. The government agencies are doing all the buying this year in the state. The MSP of wheat is far less than the market prices, but the farmers have been forced to sell off the wheat at MSP.