Farmer Committees To Boost Agriculture: Pocharam

Stating that the Telangana government had launched the farmers' coordination committee (Rythu Samithi) meetings to create awareness among the farmers on the crop investment scheme till September 14, Agriculture Minister Pocharam Srinivas Reddy said that Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao was planning to make the farmer king by turning agriculture into a highly profitable profession.

The minister was speaking at an awareness program of farmers at Bichkunda in Kamareddy district attended by over 2,000 farmers.

As part of the plan, 10,733 revenue villages would get co-ordination committees with 15 members each, including a co-ordinator. 24-member committees would operate at the mandal level. The lists would be approved by the minister concerned. District co-ordination committees would be formed by September 14, he said.

The minister exhorted the farmers to co-ordinate to provide their data of farming lands to the officials coming for the land survey. The government had launched a comprehensive land survey project to find these details so as to give the farmers the crop investment of Rs 8,000 per acre from next May, he said, and appealed to the resource persons to make the programs successful and inform the farmers about the crop investment scheme, crop colonies, soil testing, fertilizer use, support prices and others. The farmers should be aware of these issues and support the officials, he said.

"We have conducted similar meetings in 577 mandals in 30 districts so far. These are not political meetings, and will help the farmers remain united and get benefits from the government in future," he said.

The minister also said that these meetings would relieve the farmers from the problems that have been cropping up during the last 70 years.

In a separate program addressing farmers in Mahbubnagar district, Health Minister Dr C Lakshma Reddy and MP Jithender Reddy also said similar things - that the state government aimed to benefit every farmer by creating awareness to the farmer co-ordination committees in all districts.

The minister said that the co-ordination committees would have members play key roles in getting government schemes. He asked the Congress and other political parties to avoid creating obstacles to the welfare and development programs, and avoid spreading canards that only farmers affiliated to the TRS would benefit.