This is an archive article published on April 6, 2022
MVA anti-farmer, says Raju Shetti as his party walks out of alliance
Making the announcement at the Sanghatana's state executive meeting in Kolhapur, Shetti said the MVA has let down farmers and consistently ignored their demands.
DESCRIBING IT as an “anti-farmer regime”, the Raju Shetti-led Swabhimani Shetkari Sanghatana on Tuesday snapped ties with the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government, which it had supported since the alliance came to power in 2019.
Making the announcement at the Sanghatana’s state executive meeting in Kolhapur, Shetti said the MVA has let down farmers and consistently ignored their demands. “Like the MVA government in Maharashtra, the Modi government has also ditched farmers. Therefore, we are going to stay away from both of them,” he said. “The MVA government was formed on the promise of implementing the common minimum programme, which envisaged providing justice to farmers. However, the MVA is busy making anti-farmer laws and taking anti-farmer decisions,” Shetti told The Indian Express.
Leaders of the MVA, however, said efforts will be made to change Shetti’s decision and the issues raised by him will be redressed at the highest level.
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Shetti has been upset with the MVA government as it has allegedly ignored the demands raised by his organisation for the welfare of farmers. He was also promised a state cabinet berth by the NCP before the 2019 Assembly Elections. Even after coming to power, the MVA — comprising NCP, Shiv Sena and Congress — had assured him of a minister’s post, but that never materialised.
The final move that led to Shetti’s decision to leave the MVA was the government’s decision to pay Fair and Remunerative Price to sugarcane farmers in two installments instead of the ongoing practice of making the payment in a single installment. “They don’t care for me or my organisation, and therefore there is no point in staying with them,” Shetti told The Indian Express.
He said the state government was refusing to listen to him on reversing its decision on payment of FRP in two installments. “… They have completely ignored my letter written in February, urging them to take certain corrective actions, including the one on land acquisition and compensation to farmers. The government has refused to take cognisance of the letter,” he said.
He claimed that neither Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray nor NCP chief Sharad Pawar have responded to his demands. “While the CM has refused to speak to me, the NCP chief met me three days ago at a function. We shared the stage but he refused to indulge in any conversation,” Shetti said.
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The farmer leader said that at a recent press conference, Pawar had said efforts will be made to redress the outfit’s grievances.
“But I have not seen any effort to redress our grievances. Neither Pawar nor any leader from his party or the MVA has contacted me,” said Shetti. On whether the opposition BJP has approached him, Shetti said,”The BJP has not approached me… we will not join their ranks…”.
However, Congress spokesperson Gopal Tiwari said, “We are confident that the Sanghatana will remain part of the alliance. Efforts are being made to resolve the grievances raised by Shetti.”
MVA leaders said Shetti withdrawing support to the government will not have any impact on the coalition as the Sanghatana had only one MLA, who was recently expelled by the party. “The lone MLA is supporting the MVA government,” said a Sena leader, adding that the government has the support of 160 MLAs.
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Shetti said if the MVA wanted him to change his mind, then it would have to withdraw the amendments made to the Land Acquisition Act, which gives only 30 per cent compensation to farmers for acquiring their land. “Besides, they should stop the move to give FRP in two installments,” he said.
Manoj More has been working with the Indian Express since 1992. For the first 16 years, he worked on the desk, edited stories, made pages, wrote special stories and handled The Indian Express edition. In 31 years of his career, he has regularly written stories on a range of topics, primarily on civic issues like state of roads, choked drains, garbage problems, inadequate transport facilities and the like. He has also written aggressively on local gondaism. He has primarily written civic stories from Pimpri-Chinchwad, Khadki, Maval and some parts of Pune. He has also covered stories from Kolhapur, Satara, Solapur, Sangli, Ahmednagar and Latur. He has had maximum impact stories from Pimpri-Chinchwad industrial city which he has covered extensively for the last three decades.
Manoj More has written over 20,000 stories. 10,000 of which are byline stories. Most of the stories pertain to civic issues and political ones. The biggest achievement of his career is getting a nearly two kilometre road done on Pune-Mumbai highway in Khadki in 2006. He wrote stories on the state of roads since 1997. In 10 years, nearly 200 two-wheeler riders had died in accidents due to the pathetic state of the road. The local cantonment board could not get the road redone as it lacked funds. The then PMC commissioner Pravin Pardeshi took the initiative, went out of his way and made the Khadki road by spending Rs 23 crore from JNNURM Funds. In the next 10 years after the road was made by the PMC, less than 10 citizens had died, effectively saving more than 100 lives.
Manoj More's campaign against tree cutting on Pune-Mumbai highway in 1999 and Pune-Nashik highway in 2004 saved 2000 trees.
During Covid, over 50 doctors were asked to pay Rs 30 lakh each for getting a job with PCMC. The PCMC administration alerted Manoj More who did a story on the subject, asking then corporators how much money they demanded....The story worked as doctors got the job without paying a single paisa.
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