High drama as farmers descend on Bengaluru to hold protest rally

Agitation withdrawn after Bandeppa Kashempur promises to organise meeting with Chief Minister

Reaction: Farmers staging a snap protest after the police prevented them from making their way to the Vidhana Soudha in Bengaluru on Monday.

Amid farmer protests across the State — especially over the non-payment of pending dues to sugarcane growers — thousands of them held a rally in the Central Business District here on Monday.

Their other demands include immediate implementation of the farm loan waiver, three-phase power for 12 hours a day, and Minimum Support Price (MSP) for a range of agri-products.

The protest in Bengaluru was withdrawn after Cooperation Minister Bandeppa Kashempur promised a meeting with Chief Minister H.D. Kumaraswamy. Farmers have now set a 15-day deadline for the meeting.

Thousands of farmers from across the State started pouring in at Krantiveera Sangolli Rayanna Railway Station on Monday morning and announced they would lay siege to the Vidhana Soudha. The farmers took out a protest rally from the railway station towards the Vidhana Soudha.

High drama ensued as police stopped them at Freedom Park, refusing to let them go any further.

The farmers launched a sit-in protest on the busy Seshadri Road throwing traffic in CBD out of gear.

Leaders from the Karnataka Rajya Raitha Sangha and Hasiru Sene, which had organised the protest, gave two hours for Mr. Kumaraswamy to come to the spot and resolve their issues.

‘Anti-farmer policies’

The farmers raised slogans against both the State and the Union governments for “anti-farmer” policies.

“Mr. Kumaraswamy claims he is a son of the soil and had said he will remove the fence around Vidhana Soudha when he became CM. But today he is neither letting us in, nor coming to us,” rued a farmer leader.

Mr. Kashempur rushed to the spot and took the farmers’ petition promising a meeting of farmer leaders with the CM at the earliest.

K.T. Gangadhar, State president, Karnataka Rajya Raitha Sangha, then set a deadline of 15 days for the government to hold the meeting and spell out its stand on each of their 30 demands, failing which they would intensify their protests across the State.

“While the government has announced loan waiver, nationalised banks continue to give notices to farmers. The government must immediately sort out the issue. Farmers are being considered defaulters denying them new credit. This sowing season, farmers have fallen prey to moneylenders,” Mr. Gangadhar said.