Hyderabad, March 17 Wearing garlands of chillies, members of the Telangana Legislative Council belonging to the opposition Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) staged a novel protest on Monday.
BRS MLCs K. Kavitha, S. Madhusudhana Chary, Mehmood Ali, Satyavati Rathod and others staged the protest in Council premises to demand minimum support price for chillies.
Wearing garlands of chillies, holding placards and raising slogans, the MLCs demanded that a Minimum Support Price (MSP) of Rs 25,000 per quintal be fixed for chillies and solve the problems faced by chilli farmers.
The MLCs demanded that the state government put pressure on the Centre for immediate chilli procurement by the National Agricultural Cooperative Marketing Federation (NAFED) and Marketing Federation (MARKFED) at Rs 25,000 MSP.
The opposition party said the cultivation of chillies in the state has declined from 4 lakh acres in the previous season to just 2.40 lakh acres this season.
Former speaker Madhusudhana Chary told media persons that farmers in Telangana make a huge investment to cultivate chillis.
He said last year the farmers were getting Rs 25,000 for chillies but the price this year has dropped to Rs 10,000 to Rs 12,000.
Farmers, who invested lakhs of rupees, are unable to recover the input cost and are upset over losses as they are setting afire their crops.
He said the Congress party in its election manifesto had promised an MSP of Rs 16,000 for chillis. He demanded that the government should not only implement its promise but also ensure that farmers get MSP of Rs 25,000.
The BRS demanded that a separate board should be constituted for chillis and it should be provided legal status.
Pointing out that chillis still come under the Spices Board, they demanded that the produce be added to the list of food crops.
BRS MLCs also demanded that the government take steps for the export of chillis from Telangana.
The BRS MLCs said the Central and state governments fix MSP for turmeric at Rs 15,000 per quintal. They said turmeric farmers were facing hardships as they were not getting remunerative prices for their produce.
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