Punjab : Hooda demands higher sugarcane price, immediate paddy procurement
Former Haryana CM Bhupinder Singh Hooda demanded a ₹500/quintal sugarcane MSP and immediate paddy procurement. He pledged a month’s MLA salary to the CM relief fund, urging others to follow. Criticising flood mismanagement affecting 30 lakh acres and five lakh farmers, Hooda blamed BJP-led governance, alleging scams in urban drainage and rural canal maintenance.
Chandigarh: Former Haryana chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda on Wednesday demanded that the support price of sugarcane be fixed at a minimum of ₹500 per quintal and called for an immediate start to paddy procurement in the state. Hooda, while interacting with media persons at his camp office here, also announced his decision to contribute his one-month salary as an MLA to the CM relief fund, urging other MLAs to do the same. Meanwhile, referring to an anticipated crop loss by farmers, Hooda also asked the govt to reduce the market fee for farmers by at least 1%. Hooda claimed that recent floods and heavy downpours had impacted nearly 30 lakh acres of farmland across the state, resulting in losses to over five lakh farmers. He criticised the Nayab Saini-led govt for failing to assist and reach out to flood-affected families even after a month. He also shared the sorrows of families he encountered during his visit to flood-hit places in Haryana over the past week. Hooda said the farmers suffered a loss of around Rs one lakh per acre and should be adequately compensated by the govt, and that too at the earliest.The former CM stated that the floods exposed not only the poor arrangements of the BJP govt, but also its corruption.
In cities, scams were carried out in the name of the Amrit Scheme and sewerage cleaning, resulting in entire towns turning into ponds with the first rainfall. In villages and fields, canals and drains were neither cleaned nor embankments strengthened. He alleged that scams were also committed in the name of laying pipelines in many villages, which proved useless as no water was drained when the floods came.Commenting on the INLD, Hooda said both the INLD and the JJP are merely proxies of the BJP. “As the BJP cannot face the Congress directly in Haryana, it resorts to fighting through such alliances.” He recalled that last time the BJP fought a proxy battle with the support of the JJP, while this time it has tied up with the INLD. In Sirsa, the BJP even withdrew its candidate to ensure the victory of INLD ally Gopal Kanda, whose statement itself brought the BJP-INLD alliance out in the open, he added.
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Source : The Times Of India
