Ahmedabad: Cotton, which till last year had been giving good returns to farmers of Gujarat, has left many of them in distress and sparked fears that Saurashtra region may turn into another Vidarbha.
Both the regions have the same profile of erratic rainfall and absence of proper irrigation facilities which makes them dependent on the vagaries of nature. As per official figures, three farmers have committed suicide so far, including a young man who committed self-immolation in Vinchhya sub-marketing yard of the Rajkot district in Saurashtra.
Farmers are agitating for the last one months to press their demand for increasing the minimum support price (MSP) of the cotton saying that they have to incur huge loss due to the present price of Rs 810 per 20 kg. They have been holding rallies, giving memorandums and burning cottons. BJP’s sister organisation Bharatiya Kisan Sangh is spearheading the agitation which is gradually spreading to different parts of state from Saurashtra.
Sensing the opportunity, the Congress has also started agitation on the issue. Farmers are turning to cotton over the last one decade in Gujarat as it is giving good returns to them. As per the state government statistic, in 2001, the area under cotton
cultivation was 16 lakh hectares. In 2014, the estimated area under cotton cultivation has risen to 30 lakh hectares, said Deputy director H Babaria in the department of agriculture.
The estimated production of cotton this time is going to be around 1.30 lakh bales, officials said. The excess production of cotton, in addition to slump in demand from overseas has driven the price downwards in open market in comparison to last year. “Now, the situation is that farmers are not getting a fair return on cotton which has led them to commit suicide in the state like in Vidarbha,” Congress leader Manish Doshi alleged.
Vidarbha region in Maharashtra has witnessed many suicides due to failure of crop. Gujarat government had declared a package of Rs 1,100 crore giving relief to farmers in electricity bills and loan interest rebate, but farmers have rejected the package saying
that it is not enough. “We will continue our agitation till all over demands are met,” state unit president of BKS Maganbhai Patel said.
Chief Minister Anandiben Patel has said that they have fulfilled all the demands of farmers. Regarding the MSP issue, Patel said that it is up to the Centre to decide the MSP of cotton.
