The Bhartiya Kisan Union (BKU), led by Gurnam Singh Chaduni, has decided not to protest during Home Minister Amit Shah’s Sunday rally at Gohana in Haryana, three days after calling on farmers to raise slogans against the BJP governments in the state and at the Centre for a higher sugarcane price. After a meeting in Kurukshetra on Thursday, Chaduni also withdrew the agitation during which farmers had stopped supplying sugarcane to all the 14 sugar mills since January 20. Demanding that the state advisory price (SAP) for sugarcane be hiked from Rs 362 to Rs 450 per quintal, they had been camping outside the mills, effectively locking them up. “The farmers cannot hold the sugarcane crop for long as it cannot be used for other purposes. But we are upset with the meagre hike in the prices of sugarcane. We will teach the anti-farmer BJP a lesson in the 2024 Lok Sabha and Assembly polls,” Chaduni said, referring to Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar’s announcement that the SAP would be increased from Rs 362 to Rs 372 per quintal. The revised price is still less than the Rs 380 offered by neighbouring Punjab.Haryana had offered the highest price for sugarcane till Punjab’s AAP government one-upped it. The Samyukt Kisan Morcha, which spearheaded the agitation against the three controversial farm laws, also held a rally at Jind over issues including sugarcane prices. For his part, Khattar also accused the Opposition and some farmer unions of doing politics over sugarcane prices. “Farmers also understand today that the sugar mills are running losses and despite this, the government is taking decisions in the farmers' interest,” he said Wednesday. The chief minister said that though the sugar price had not increased as expected, the government was giving high prices for sugarcane. “The sugar mills are constantly making losses, but we have time and again safeguarded the farmers' interest,” he said. Khattar said the sugar mills were facing a loss of Rs 5,293 crore. According to him, the average cost of sugar production is Rs 4,341 per quintal, much higher than the selling price of sugar—Rs 3,400 per quintal. “An amount of Rs 1,005 crore was provided as loans to the cooperative sugar mills and Rs 329 crore was given as subsidy to all cooperative and private sugar mills in the past two years (2020-21 and 2021-22) as financial assistance,” he added. The percentage of sugar recovery in the cooperative mills is 9.75 per cent while the percentage for private mills is 10.24, according to Khattar. The chief minister said that to make the mills financially stable, the capacity of cooperative sugar mills was being increased and ethanol and energy plants were being set up.
