In a bid to intensify his struggle against Land Ordinance and rising number of farmer suicides in the country, Congress Vice-President Rahul Gandhi on Thursday will visit five villages in Vidarbha that face the problem of farmers’ suicides.
“This will be the beginning of Rahulji’s and our party’s pan-India movement against the present government’s absolute neglect towards the issue of farming distress in the country,” said Ashok Chavan, Congress MP and party’s Maharashtra unit chief.
Mr. Gandhi will arrive in Nagpur on Wednesday night and will visit five villages in the Amaravati district of Vidarbha during his one-day visit on Thursday. Amaravati has recorded largest number of farmer suicides in 2015. Around 295 farmers ended their lives here, while 215 suicides were witnessed in Aurangabad of state’s Marathwada region.
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As per his schedule, Mr. Gandhi will carry out a padyatra of 15 kilometres, visiting families of farmers and other villagers. “He will interact with the kins of those who committed suicide and talk to farmers,” said Mr. Chavan. He will be visiting villages namely Gunji, Shahapur, Ramgaon, Ranjana and Toglabar.
When reminded about Mr. Gandhi’s earlier visit to Yavatmal in Vidarbha, Mr. Chavan said that the then government honestly initiated several steps to solve the problems of farmers. “This government is pretending to sleep and conveniently neglecting the problem. We want them to initiate concrete steps to curb the suicides,” he said.
Mr. Chavan attacked the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) – led state and centre governments for handling the issue of farmers’ suicides in absolute insensitive manner.
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