Thousands Farmers arrest in Raipur

     Raipur, March 18, 2010: Several thousand farmers were today arrested while proceeding towards the Chhattisgarh Assembly to remind the Raman Singh Government to fulfill its promises made during the election for the farmers.

     The large numbers of farmers were proceeding towards the assembly they were stopped at the Awantibai square police and local administration and subsequently arrested.

     However, it was perhaps for the first time that any agitationist forwarded their memorandum to the assembly Speaker after their demands were not fulfilled.

     The Chhattisgarh Sanyukt Kisan Morcha had earlier given memorandum to the Governor and the Chief Minister and seeing  that the demands were ignored a delegation today went to the Speaker Dharam Lal Kaushik to urge him to look into their problems.

     Among the nine points demand the farmers have been asking for payment of Rs 270 as bonus per quintal of paddy, increase in minimum support price of paddy to Rs 1400, free electricity to pumps for agriculture purpose and the farmers be paid interest free loan to purchase farm equipments.