BENGALURU: Trying to draw Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s attention to the plight of horticulture farmers during the pandemic, former Prime Minister HD Deve Gowda shot off another letter on Monday. Sharing a copy of the letter on his social media pages on Tuesday, he said the crashing prices of horticulture produce across the country have the potential to affect livelihoods of small and marginal farmers in rural India during the pandemic.
“Covid reaching rural India is a worrying problem, but crashing prices of horticultural produce are delivering a twin blow to the rural masses,” Gowda said. This is the second time the former Prime Minister is writing an open letter over the pandemic to Modi.Citing examples from Kolar, Uttar Pradesh, Kerala and Himachal Pradesh of farmers destroying their crops due to the price crash, Gowda asked the Central government to urge State governments to find a solution to this brewing crisis and help farmers.
He was also keen to highlight that the State governments were already financially tied up. “State governments that are burdened with procuring vaccines and building Covid-19 infrastructure are left with little funds to rush to the help of small and medium horticulture farmers,” Gowda said, adding that reverse migration from cities due to the lockdown, and growing unemployment figures should not lead to a heated social cauldron of unrest. “People in rural areas may survive the pandemic, but may have nothing to live on,” warned Gowda.