LAHORE:
As many as 2,000 farmers of the Pakistan Kissan Ittehad from various districts congregated at Thokar Niaz Baig and blocked it for traffic for several hours on Thursday. The series of demonstrations was called off later in the day following negotiations with government representatives led by MNA Hamza Shahbaz Sharif.
Pakistan Kissan Ittehad president Khalid Khohkar said on Wednesday night, a heavy contingent of policemen stopped the farmers from entering Lahore by placing containers on Multan Road.
On Thursday, the protesters held a demonstration at Thokar Niaz Baig. A large police contingent, equipped with a water cannon and armoured vehicles, was deployed at the scene. Traffic wardens diverted the traffic to alternative routes.
Shariful Islam, one of the protesters, said they had planned to stage a demonstration at Minar-i-Pakistan but the city district government and police had not allowed them to enter the city.
“This so-called people’s government had promised us the moon…the prime minister assured relief at the time of the floods.”
Piran Ditta, another protester, said peasants from Okara, Multan, Lodhran, Kabirwala, Chishtian, Chichawatni, Jahanian, Jhang and Chiniot arrived in the city on Wednesday to join the PKI’s protest against the government.
The protesters demanded that the government remove the GST on pesticides. “We cannot afford to buy pesticides,” Akbar Malik, a farmer from Jahania, said. “We used up all our savings to reconstruct our houses after the floods.”
He said Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif visited his village after the floods on October 11 and promised to provide seeds and fertilisers for free so that they could grow wheat season. “Unfortunately that never happened,” he said.
Bashir Ahmed, a farmer from Jhang, said that the government could give loans to small-scale farmers on easy installments to help them out of the financial rut. “We are the backbone of Pakistan’s economy,” he said.
“We want the government to subsidise the electricity needed to run tube-wells,” Ghulam Ali Dogar, another farmer said.
Umar Daraz, another protester, condemned the aggressive attitude of the police which manhandled and thrashed farmers protesting peacefully on The Mall on Wednesday. “What the police did on the behest of the government is not justified. It reflects the government’s callous attitude towards small-scale farmers who do not have the means available to the landed elite to strong-arm the government,” he said.
Breakthrough
Representing the government, former law minister Rana Sanaullah, Chief Secretary Khizar Hayat Gondal, Principal Secretary to Chief Minister Imdadullah Bosal, Minister for Irrigation Yawar Zaman and MNA Hamza Shahbaz Sharif held negotiations with representatives of the PKI at the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz Central Secretariat in Model Town. The farmers were assured that cases registered against some farmers for protesting will be immediately withdrawn.
Sharif told the farmers that they would fix a support price for wheat that would be acceptable to farmers.
He said the government would purchase wheat from farmers at fixed rates and the wheat procurement campaign will continue till the last grain of wheat was bought.
He said they would speak to the federal government regarding removal of GST on pesticide. He said complaints of overbilling of electricity used to operate tube-wells will be addressed.
Sharif said the government was trying to reduce the price of fertiliser and seeds. “We will try to address all genuine complaints of the farmers,” he said.
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