NEW DELHI: Bhartiya Kisan Union leader Rakesh Tikait on Sunday said the farmer’s agitation against the three new agriculture product market laws may continue till December this year.
“This agitation possibly will stretch up to November or December this year,” the BKU national spokesperson said in Allahabad, news agency PTI reported. Tikait said during his poll campaigning in West Bengal, he came to know that some central government people have been asking for one feastful of rice from the farmers.
The BKU leader said, “I have advised Bengal farmers to ask grain seekers to fix an MSP of `1,850 per quintal for paddy before giving them a single grain of rice.”
The farmer leader said after Bengal, he was planning to visit other parts of the country to press for the enactment of a law guaranteeing an MSP for various crops.
Demanding a law guaranteeing the minimum support price for various crops, Tikait said in Bihar, the paddy is currently being bought by traders at an abysmally low rate of `750 to `800 per quintal.
The BKU leader said he was not going to sit in Delhi till the three new agricultural laws are not abolished.
He said was planning to visit all over the country, including Madhya Pradesh on March 14 and 15, Ganga Nagar in Rajasthan on March 17, Ghazipur’s UP Gate border in Delhi on March 18, Odisha on March 19 and Karnataka on March 21 and 22.
The three new farm market laws will lead to the closure of all small-time neighbourhood shops, leaving only big commercial malls to survive, the BKU spokesperson claimed.
“These farm laws will ruin traders and lead to the closure of small business utilities and the collapse of small industries. These laws will bring in big multinational firms like Wallmart,” claimed Tikait.
Tikait said, “Had this government belonged to a political party, it would have talked to farmers and resolved the matter. But this government is being run by big business houses. It is bent upon selling the entire country.”AGENCIES