Vijayapura: Expressing concern over the sharp decline in the prices of onion in the open market in the distrzict which has caused worry among the farmers, Former Minister and Veteran Congress MLA Shivanand Patil has demanded the Government to come to the rescue by announcing Minimum Support Price for onion.
Speaking to mediapersons on Sunday Feburary 26, he said that, the Government should declare Rs. 2,000 per quintal for onions which will help the distressed farmers to recover some loss.
“The farmers are unable to recover even the cost of transport, leave alone making profit. While the farmers spent around Rs. 7 for cultivating a kilogram of onion, today, the farmers are getting less than Rs. 5 per kg for onion in the open market. The farmers cannot wait for price to rise for too long because onion is a perishable commodity. Therefore, the Government must come to the rescue of the farmers immediately,” he said.
Claiming that the govern6ment had announced to reserve Rs. 3,000 Crore revolving funds to the farmers during the distressed period, Patil wondered where the funds had gone and whether it was ever used for the farmers or not. “What is the use of reserving revolving funds if that could not be used to help the farmers?,” he questioned.
“When such a situation occurs, neither the Agriculture nor Horticulture Minister utters a word about this critical issue being faced by the farmers,” he said.
On the long discussed issue of merging Agriculture, Horticulture and APMC Ministry to make a single Ministry, Patil said that when the bifurcation of Ministry did not yield a desired result of helping farmers and improving farming sector, then it is better to merge them and make a single broader department. “Even the Agriculture Universities which are supposed to help the farmers with technology and cost effective farming methods, are proving to be a white elephant with most of the funds being spent only on salaries of the staff,” he noted.
