Hyderabad: Weavers from Telangana state staged a protest at Jantar Mantar in Delhi under the banner of ‘Weavers United JAC’ alleging that the state government had turned ignored their welfare, and said that around 350 weavers had committed suicide so far.
Several political leaders including TS MPs Bandi Sanjay Kumar and Dharmapuri Arvind of the BJP, Komatireddy Venkata Reddy of the Congress, CPI general secretary Suravaram Sudhakar Reddy and others expressed their solidarity with the weavers.
Mr Dasu Suresh, chairman of the Weavers United JAC, said “Weavers do not have insurance and a health card. If a weaver dies, the family will be on the streets.”
He criticised the TRS government for not releasing hundreds of crores of arrears to the weavers of Sircilla and that 50 per cent subsidy on yarn was not implemented.
Prof. Tatikonda Rajaiah, advisor to the JAC, said the government had announced a Rs 1,273-crore budget for two years for the development of the weavers but not even a quarter of the amount had been spent by them so far.
He said the state government was not speaking about the Rs 5-lakh free insurance to each of the weavers’ family though it was announced about 10 months ago.
The JAC leaders demanded that the state government make weavers eligible for treatment in any private hospital and exemption from GST on yarn, colour dyes and related chemicals.
The JAC leaders alleged that none of the Centre’s schemes for weavers were being implemented in Telangana state.
