HYDERABAD: Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao has vowed to take the agitation against the anti-farmer policies of the Centre to the national level by involving farmers from across the nation.
Participating in a three-hour ‘maha dharna’ at dharna chowk along with all top TRS leaders here on Thursday, he demanded the Union government to spell out its stand on procurement of paddy from Telangana. He said he will wait for two days for a response from the Centre before deciding on the next course of action.
Meanwhile, he expressed solidarity with farmers from north India, who have been on protest for over a year now demanding the Centre to withdraw the new farm laws.
"This is just the beginning. We will take the agitation to any extent to protect the interests of farmers and those of Telangana state," Rao warned and made it clear that the movement would continue till the Centre relents and starts procuring rice from Telangana on par with Punjab.
Touching other topics, Rao came down heavily against the Centre for sitting on Telangana government's demands for increasing quota for Muslims and Scheduled Tribes, categorisation of Scheduled Castes and conducting caste-wise census of BCs.
Dismissing BJP’s criticism for staging protests despite being in power, Rao recalled that Prime Minister Narendra Modi sat on a 51-hour dharna when he was the Chief Minister of Gujarat in 2006. He said that it was the responsibility of Modi to avoid a situation where the Chief Minister has to sit on dharna.
"I have been exhorting the Centre in the last 50 days to clarify whether it would procure paddy from Telangana or not in rabi season. Even meeting Union food minister Piyush Goyal has had no effect," Rao stated.
He accused the BJP of whipping up ‘communal’ sentiments during elections.
"The BJP leaders are threatening to send me to jail. Do they really think that KCR will be scared?" he fumed.
Later, a TRS delegation, minus Rao, met Governor Tamilisai Soundararajan in Raj Bhavan and submitted a representation on paddy procurement from Telangana.
