Rahul Gandhi’s meeting in Warangal is to give confidence to the farmers who were left in the lurch by the Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) government and also explain what the Congress did to the farming community and what it proposes to do for their prosperity, CLP leader Bhatti Vikramarka and Nalgonda MP N. Uttam Kumar Reddy said.
Speaking to reporters here along with senior leaders Komatireddy Venkata Reddy, D. Sreedhar Babu, T Jayparakash Reddy, Madhu Yaskhi Goud, Mahesh Kumar Goud and A. Maheshwar Reddy, they said the meeting would expose how the farmers were denied their rightful benefits by the TRS government.
Mr. Bhatti explained how Congress helped farmers with input subsidy, assistance during natural calamities, crop insurance, huge subsidy on sprinklers, poly houses and drip irrigation. Now all these have been withdrawn by the government in the name of Rythu Bandhu. This will be the third meeting of Rahul Gandhi for farmers after Nirmal and Sangareddy meetings.
Mr. Uttam Kumar Reddy said Mr. Gandhi would send a message that only Congress will stand by the farmers. He said KCR has cheated the farmers with false promises and the farm loan waiver of ₹1 lakh loan has now increased to ₹4 lakh with interest as the government failed to pay.
He said not a single rupee has been given as compensation for the crops lost due to natural calamities and Telangana was the only State that doesn’t implement crop insurance. Fertilisers prices have shot up during KCR and Modi’s rule but farmers don’t get any support.
Condemns arrest
The Congress meeting also condemned the arrest of Gujarat MLA Jignesh Mewani for his tweet against Prime Minister, Narendra Modi. The meeting felt that the BJP was snatching away the freedom of speech assured by the Constitution of India.