LAHORE: Farmers are holding a “tractor march” in the provincial capital on Dec 20 to put pressure on the Parvez Elahi government for accepting their demands.

Pakistan Kissan Ittehad (PKI) President Mian Umair Masood told Dawn here on Wednesday that farmers would hold a “tractor march” in Lahore on Dec 20 against the failure of the Punjab government to meet their demands despite making pledges in this regard.

He said Parliamentary Affairs Minister Raja Basharat had assured the PKI representatives recently that the government would take strict action against hoarders of Urea fertiliser, which was being sold at Rs3,200 per 50kg bag, a rate far above the official Rs2,250 per bag price.

The provincial government has yet to release subsidy on DAP compost, nor it has fixed wheat support price on a par with the Sindh government, which fixed it at Rs4,000 per 40kg.

Likewise, the farmers had demanded Rs370 per maund support price of sugarcane, but the government has not yet taken any step in this regard, while sugar millers have been given a free hand to purchase the yield from the growers against simple paper slips, instead of proper cane purchase receipt (CPR), as required under the law, he says.

Mr Masood laments that the millers are exploiting the growers by making deductions from the cane weight as the authorities look the other way.

He says the federal government has also not issued any notification so far for collecting Rs13 per unit bill for the electricity being consumed by the farm tube-wells, though the step part of the Rs1,800 billion so-called ‘Kissan Package’ announced by Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif to stimulate agricultural growth in the country.

Published in Dawn, December 15th, 2022