"Lesser quantity of fertiliser is now being given in sacks and the price has been increased," she said. "They have a lot of issues but govt isn't listening. They know that farmers are on roads for months. They are being mowed down by vehicles."
Congress General Secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra on Friday visited the families of four farmers who allegedly fell ill and passed away earlier this week while waiting in queue for fertilisers for a few days in Uttar Pradesh’s Lalitpur district. The Congress leader accused the UP government of failing to protect its farmers.
“Lesser quantity of fertiliser is now being given in sacks and the price has been increased,” she said. “They have a lot of issues but govt isn’t listening. They know that farmers are on roads for months. They are being mowed down by vehicles.”
“Sharing the pain has been our tradition. The pain of village, poor, labourer, farmer is the pain of Congress,” read a post shared by the UP Congress’ official Twitter handle, along with an image of the Congress leader consoling the bereaved family members.
Amongst the farmers who died was 53-year-old Bhogilal Pal, who had been standing in a queue outside a shop to try and arrange fertilisers for his land in Nayagaon village for the second consecutive day on Friday, when he collapsed.
“The govt has failed, it has completely ignored farmers. This is not an issue of these four farmers alone, this is an issue faced by the whole of Bundelkhand,” Priyanka Gandhi said. According to the administration, the demand for fertilisers shot up recently due to the rain.
District Magistrate Annavi Dinesh Kumar recommended to the state government that the family be provided financial help of Rs 10 lakh. According to the deceased farmer’s nephew, Pal had visited several shops in the past few days trying to arrange fertilisers. On Thursday, he went to a shop at Jugpura, but the queue was long and his turn never came.
The administration, however, has said that there is no shortage of fertilisers in the district.
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