Team Herald
MARGAO: Goa Forward Party (GFP) president Vijai Sardesai distributed vegetable seeds and manure to the farmers of Fatorda under the “We For Fatorda” initiative.
Sardesai said he has been doing this distribution for the last 11 years and would continue to do so to take all farmers forward.
He said that BJP government has brought the farmers on the roads all across the country.
He said, “The country’s farmers are on streets demanding that the anti-farmer laws be scrapped. Today, the Supreme Court of India had to intervene and give an ultimatum to the Union Government to decide with regards to the three farm laws. This is the current state of our farmers in the country.”
Sardesai said when he was the Agriculture Minister he had initiated the community farming scheme which has now been put on the back burner by the Pramod Sawant government.
The GFP chief said, “Forty-five files of water pump subsidy from Quepem, the Agriculture Minister’s constituency, are pending and not approved by the State government and two mini tractor subsidy files from Fatorda are rejected. When I was the minister we used to clear the files on a daily basis. In fact we used to call for the files from the department and approve them.”
“The government should come out with a white paper with regards to the total number of subsidy files cleared by Agriculture Department in last one year. I have learnt from sources that files are pending for almost three months in Agriculture Minister’s Chamber,” Sardesai said.
Noting that minister’s staff has been informing farmers that files are pending as they are studying the matter, he said, “This government led by Dr Pramod Sawant is financially and morally bankrupt. They want bribe even from farmers.”
“Pramod Sawant perhaps wants the farmers in Goa to give up farming and start cultivating cannabis. I don’t understand what type of doctor he is,”Sardesai claimed. “This Sawantwadi government wants to finish off Goenkar farmers. The BJP government led by Pramod Sawant is anti-farmer”, he alleged.
The former Agriculture Minister said, “Community farming schemes that I started for farmers are floating in the middle. The government has purposely stopped these schemes”.
He said, “Some farmers from Fatorda have complained saying that the prices of the procurement of local horticulture produce have reached the lowest.”
“When I was a minister these prices never reduced, in fact procurement price was almost double. Pramod Sawant wants to paralyse agriculture and change the crop to cannabis in the name of Swayampurna Goa. Invasive species that are not suited to the State will enter Goa as the existing farmers will choke and stop their cultivation,” he alleged and warned the government to immediately increase the procurement price for Goan vegetables as suggested by the Agriculture Department, failing which he and his party would raise the issue at appropriate forum.
