Only protests, no debate in Belagavi?

Belagavi: With the Assembly polls drawing close, the state government is intent on making full use of the winter session of the legislature commencing in Belagavi on Monday, to discuss several serious issues. Leaders, farmers and the people of north-Karnataka at large are upset that the winter session is being organised merely as a formality at Suvarna Vidhana Soudha for eight to ten days and are keenly waiting to see if the session that starts Monday will be any different.

Many of CM Siddaramaiah's cabinet ministers, who run sugar factories including Cooperatives Minister Ramesh Jarkiholi, are yet to settle the pending bills running into crores, of farmers who supplied cane to their factories. The clout of the sugar lobby comprising these ministers and legislators, has worsened the cane crisis and protests by cane growers have become a routine affair during the winter sessions.

A large number of cane growers who supplied cane to Jarkiholi's factory near Kittur, have threatened to commit mass suicide in front of Suvarna Soudha when the session starts on Monday as the factory has failed to settle their pending bills. “How can the government ensure payment of cane bills by other sugar factories when a cabinet minister himself is unwilling to settle it? The government has neither streamlined the process of payment of bills by factories nor did it issue orders to factories to ensure prompt payment,'' the agitating cane growers said.

Association of Sugar Cane Growers has decided to hold another meeting of farmer leaders on November 15 in an attempt to make the government fix a suitable price for cane. Cane growers from different parts of the state will be staging protests in front of Suvarna Soudha after November 15 if the government fails to meet their demands.

Noted farmer leader Kodihalli Chandrashekhar said in Belagavi that farmers under the banner of Karnataka Rajya Raitha Sangha and Hasiru Sene will stage a protest in front of the Soudha on the inaugural day of the session. The major demands of the farmers include total waiver of farmer loans, implementation of all pending irrigation projects, scientific support prices for crops and  supply of quality power to farmers’ pumpsets.

The session will also face the heat from various private hospitals and doctors who have decided to stage an agitation against the proposed private hospitals bill. According to sources, around 5,000 doctors from various hospitals headed by Indian Medical Association will take part in the agitation on the inaugural day and will launch an indefinite hunger strike if their demands are ignored, from Nov. 14. Meanwhile, a team of pro-Maharashtra leaders from both Belagavi and Maharashtra is gearing up to hold a Marathi session parallel to the winter session in Belagavi on Nov. 13 demanding the merger of Belagavi and its surrounding areas with Maharashtra state.