New Delhi: Farmer-dominated pockets of Gujarat, like Saurashtra, have not been kind to the Bharatiya Janata Party during the 2017 Gujarat Assembly Elections.
“Farmers were angry and the angst was translated into an anti-incumbency vote. We had warned the state government about a backlash,” said Mohini Mohan, National Secretary of Bharatiya Kisan Sangh (BKS).
Absence of farmers' vote from the ruling party’s kitty was so glaring that Yogendra Yadav told CNN-News18, “The BJP needs to introspect. Farmers are an issue for them.”
“Groundnut and cotton have failed in Gujarat. Their prices have crashed. The agrarian crisis in Gujarat, like other parts of the country, is severe. Farmers are in distress,” added Yadav.
Mukti Mohan claims that the BKS held multiple rallies in the state to convey farmer distress to the state government but to no avail. “We told the government about their badly implemented policies. For example, the crop insurance policy was made to benefit insurance companies and not us,” he said.
Echoing the sentiment, former treasurer of Gujarat Khedut Samaj, Hardik Desai said, “Agrarian crisis has multiple points here. Farmer’s shouldn’t be made to sell crops at a loss. There should be proper power supply and the government should look into the shrinking land ownership. Sustainable agriculture is not possible at the current MSP.”
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