(Online Desk)
In a surprising move, a record 242 farmers have filed their nominations as candidates to fight from Nizamabad Lok Sabha constituency, where none other than the ruling party president and chief minister K Chandrasekhara Rao’s daughter K Kavitha is seeking second term.
When retaining of the Nizamabad seat become more prestigious as has to face a stiff challenge from one of former Congress party’s heavyweight D Srinivas’s son, who entered the fray on BJP ticket, besides the tradition Congress rival Madhu Yaski Goud, so many farmers entry into the fray, indeed creates unneeded embarrassment to the ruling party nominee’s poll prospects.
The farmers, not only Telangana, but also elsewhere in the country, opts to enter electoral fray only to highlight their distress to the Centre.
Defying prohibitory orders large number of farmers queued up before the Electoral Officer to file their nomination papers, each shelling out Rs 25,000 as security deposit. They apparently collected this amount from every household in their respective villages.
One of the young farmer, who filed his nomination, told waiting newsmen that their protest was against the Centre’s failure to ensure remunerative prices to their produce and also the constitution of a Turmeric Board.
Meanwhile, the BJP’s general secretary, Ram Madhav, who was campaigning for party nominee, gave a categorical assurance to the turmeric farmers in the region that their genuine problems will be redressed as it has incorporated this promise in their party’s manifesto. At an election rally, he said his party government at the Centre would bring a new market definition scheme to assure remunerative price for turmeric farmers across the country too.