Davol, Dahisana, Varetha: The lack of irrigation water in North Gujarat has led to consistent depletion in farming patterns in the area, and with the absence of any government aid, most farmers are now resorting to animal husbandry. The younger lot has migrated to urban areas of the state. Frustrated with indifference to their problems, three villages, with a total of around 10,000 votes, say they have been boycotting elections for three years now.

Approximately 50 kilometres away from the urban centre of Mehsana, lies a dry and barren rural belt, usually known for water scarcity as in case of other districts in North Gujarat. However, the nature of problems in the past five years has evolved, and the farmers now have much more to deal with.

“There was a time when farming in our village used to be done in all three seasons. We would earn well and never needed to look into alternatives. Things have changed now, the economy might have improved, but we are going down,” Jaswant, 30, from Davol told NewsClick. Most of the farmers in the belt of Davol, Dahisana, and Varetha are either landless or own very little land, two bighas or less.

Premji Prajapati, a 52-year-old frail farmer, owns half bigha land in the village of Dahisana. Since he cannot farm in the small space he has owing to the prevailing water uncertainty, he grows cattle fodder there.

Premji Prajapati owns just half a bigha of land, earns 2500 Rs a month via daily wage, the sole source to run his family of three.

“I do not even sell the fodder that I grow, I feed it to neighbouring cows and buffaloes. It is not much and will not make any difference to my economic condition. I rely on my daily wages for that,” said Prajapati.

The amount that Prajapati is paid for working in Mehsana or in a more well-to-do farmer’s field is Rs 250 a day. However, when asked how many days he actually gets work, he laughed and said, “that is the uncertain part. The maximum work that I get in a month is for 10 days only.”

As per the villagers, over 50% of farmers in Dahisana own less than two bighas. When farming conditions were better, their economic condition was good, too. Slowly, as the farmers had to dig as deep as 800ft to find groundwater, they were forced to resort to animal husbandry for their earnings. With this shift, rose their cost of investment. Cattle fodder became expensive, and due to lack of water,the farmers were forced to make a choice.

“We could either grow seasonal vegetables and other crops like groundnut or grow cattle fodder. Since the other crops were an expensive investment with uncertain outcomes, we had to resort to growing cattle fodder where the loss was comparatively less, and it could be used even in adverse conditions,” said Krishna, another farmer from Dahisana. Krishna’s economic condition is slightly better than most other farmers in his village. He owns three bighas and has some livestock.

Most of the villagers in Dahisana own less than 2 bighas of land, some of the citizens of Dahisana.

NewsClick travelled to three villages to understand the current conditions of farmers. With every new villager we encountered, the situation seemed to be getting worse. We encountered more and more farmers with little land and ones who were only growing cattle fodder. With the era of Internet boom in the country and rapid rise in the urban economy, the condition of farmers in this belt of North Gujarat have only worsened.

Valji Choudhary,m 52, virtually broke into tears while talking about his condition. Only a part of his three-bigha land was in use now. “I would have left this hell long back had it not been for my ancestral land. Now, I am so immersed into loans that I cannot afford to go any other place before repaying everything,” he said. Valji has two buffaloes, one cow, and a family of four to cater to, all via the dairy products that he sells.

Valji working on his ancestral land feeding water to his livestock.

“Government policies and subsidies could make our situation better, only if they were applicable to us,” said Valji. The Centre has a subsidy plan of 55% for drip and irrigation farming for small and marginal farmers across the country. However, all that Valji is able to use on the small land he has is the same water supply that he has for drinking at home. Therefore, hundreds like him are laid off from this scheme.

Approximately five years ago, the situation got worse for farmers here. Most now had either resorted completely to animal husbandry or were doing daily wage jobs. The hopes of growing any other crop on their land except fodder and groundnut were slowly fading out. The farmers started knocking on the doors of every minister they could reach in Gandhinagar. A delegation even met the state irrigation minister and other government representatives. But all in vain.

Seeing no results, and a drop in their income level with each passing year, the farmers three years ago, decided to boycott elections.

“If the so-called representatives cannot do anything to bring us out of the crisis we are in, why should we vote for them?” said a villager from Varetha. One fine day in 2019, people from all three villages gathered in the nearby ‘Varahi Maata Mandir’, a shared temple between the three villages. A decision was made, and the collective answer was to boycott elections.

The ‘Varahi temple’ at Dahisana where villagers of Davol, Dahisana, and Varetha pledged to not vote until their plights were listened to.

“Since that day, we do not pay any heed to politicians of any party. They are all thieves,” he added. NewsClick found that in all these three villages, there is no ‘sarpanch’ as of now. The villagers said when the time for the sarpanch election came, none of them filed nominations.

Not just in the sarpanch elections, even when it came elect delegates for the tehsil, which is done for the three villages collectively, none of the leaders from the three villages filed a nomination. “We are going to refrain from voting in the upcoming Vidhan Sabha as well. ‘Pehle samadhan, do fir vote lo’(first give us solutions then come asking for votes) is our motto now,” said the villagers in unison.

Urban Shift of ‘New Age’ Farmers

In the age of high inflation rate and lack of land and farming conditions in their village, the young village boys are now compelled to move to urban areas like Surat, Ahmedabad, and Gandhinagar. “With complete negligence of our issues one year after another, there has been a compelling urban shift here,” said Jaswant.

Jaswant, 30, is still in the village unlike his peers and is in constant search of a government job. “I will leave the village as soon as I land a government job. In 20% of the houses, at least one person has now migrated to a city,” he said. He has completed his Masters, and has also cleared the Teachers Entrance Test exam. He has been a
part of the recent protests against the government about filling up vacant jobs of ‘vidyasahayaks’ as well. He is duly qualified and is confident of getting a job if pending vacancies since 2017 are filled. However, he currently works in his ancestral land.

Naresh and Sahil from Dahisana work in Surat and Ahmedabad, respectively. They left their villages as soon as they turned 18. They say they saw no future in farming. The stories they used to hear about their grandfathers from their parents painted an entirely different picture from what was in front of their eyes. Cattle fodder and groundnut, currently the only crops grown in their villages, will not help them support their families. “With no help from the government, our survival will be in question if we stay here for long,” said Naresh does diamond rubbing work in Surat.

A considerable number of daily wage workers and small-scale farmers do not even own a house in their village. Shankar, 50, narrates the plight of marginalised farmers, being one of them. Riding his Luna moped, he stopped when he saw a couple of villagers speaking with NewsClick.

Among five brothers, two bigha land is supposed to be divided. Shankar’s share boils down to less than a bigha. “My biggest dilemma is to whether make a house for myself there or to rear a cow and buffalo. I chose the latter long back. But a huge chunk of the money that I earn via that, goes towards house rent. Hence, in order to meet monthly expenses, I travel from village to village selling shoes and slippers,” he said. Mother nature has not been very kind to us, he said, adding that they do not see much rainfall. Government aid is the only plausible solution.

The angry and disenchanted villagers, however, are adamant about not voting even in the upcoming Assembly elections. While the Scheduled Castes (SC) and Other Backward Castes (OBC)- dominated belt in the Mehsana district continues to revolt, their plight has failed to reach the ruling party’s (BJP) manifesto with each election. The youth of the village, on the other side, see an end of farming culture in their villages and hope to find economic revival, mingling with the crowd that migrates to the big cities.

The writer is a freelance journalist based in Delhi and is travelling to Gujarat to report on the Assembly elections.

Courtesy: Newsclick

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In a spate of incidents of land grabbing and expropriation by government authorities, a recent report by The Indian Express (IE) said that as many as 46 farmers in Old Diva village in Gujarat’s Ankleshwar Taluka were detained by the police for protesting and obstructing the work of officials carrying out land acquisition processes for the Vadodara-Mumbai Express Highway who later damaged the standing crops on 50 acres of land owned by 35 farmers, reported The Indian Express.

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On April 2, 2018, Gujarat government acquired about 200 hectares of land in Badi and Thordi villages of Ghogha, Bhavnagar.

The post Gujarat Farmers Barred From Entering Own Land as GPCL Mines Lignite Under Police Protection appeared first on SabrangIndia.

Image: Reuters

“A total of 5,259 people, comprising farmers and their family members from 12 affected villages, have sought icchha mrityu as the land they cultivate is being forcibly snatched by the state government and Gujarat Power Corporation Limited (GPCL),” claims Narendrasinh Gohil, a local farmer and a member of Gujarat Khedut Samaj, an organisation fighting for farmers’ rights.

Gohil says the letters, signed by these farmers and their families, have been sent to the President of India, the Prime Minister and the Chief Minister of Gujarat. Harshad Patel, Collector, Bhavnagar, has confirmed that the farmers have dropped these letters at the registry branch of the collectorate. However, he did not specify the number of farmers who had written or signed these letters.

The farmers have accused the state government, and GPCL, of using police force to get them to vacate the land. “On two occasions, the police have fired teargas on a peaceful gathering of farmers. We are being threatened and bullied by the government,” Gohil alleged. He added that the district administration has imposed section 144 of the CrPC in the 12 villages for over a month. In their letters farmers said that the “forcible acquisition” of land was making them feel like “terrorists” and, therefore, they would like to be killed by bullets fired by Army personnel.

The farmers alleged that GPCL was trying to possess the land more than 20 years after the power firm had acquired it, adding that such a move was against the law. “As per the Land Acquisition Act, 2013, a company cannot take possession of a land which it had acquired more than five years ago. To possess such a land, it will have to initiate the process of acquisition afresh,” Gohil said.
 

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Dr Tushaar Shah (left) with Gujarat official Sujit Gulati

Well-informed sources have told Counterview that though two top state officials have personally examined the experiment, carried out under the direction of well-known water expert Dr Tushaar Shah of the International Water Management Institute (IWMI), things have refused to move.”

The experiment involves using solar pumps instead of diesel or electricity pumps for using groundwater for irrigation, but with a rider: The state government should connect the pumps with the state electricity grid and buy up whatever electricity is left unused after the farmers are done with irrigation.

Talking with Counterview on the sidelines of a media conference in Ahmedabad for promoting the experiment, Dr Shah explained, “If power is bought over by the state power distribution company, it would incentivize farmers to stop overexploiting groundwater for irrigation, even as turning them into solar power producers, helping climate change.”

Asked why the Gujarat government didn’t seem interested in the proposal, Dr Shah said, “Additional chief secretary, energy and petrochemicals, Sujit Gulati, personally visited the village Dhundi, where the experiment began two-and-a-half years ago, and found it very useful. We hope that our proposal will be accepted.”

The second official, who visited the village to oversee the experiment, and found it “interesting”, was state rural development commissioner Jayanthi Ravi. Interestingly, the Gujarat chief minister in an IWMI note has been quoted as praising the experiment, with the suggestion that a new solar policy would clinch the issue.
 

Jayanthi Ravi with Dr Tushaar Shah

Farmers’ solar power generation cooperative members, Dhundi

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Police resorted to lathicharge and lobbying of tear gas shells after senior police officials of the district were injured in stone pelting.
 

According to Asari, who received injury on his head, some agitating farmers hurled stones on the policemen deployed on Sanand-Nal Sarovar road, from where, farmers living near Nal Sarovar had planned to take out their rally till Gandhinagar to protest scarcity of irrigation water.

“To raise the issue of water supply, farmers living in villages near Nal Sarovar had announced to take a rally till Gandhinagar today, for which, police had already denied them permission. When the rally reached near Sanand, we tried to convince some of their leaders not to go ahead,” said Asari.

“When our talks were on with leaders, some persons in the rally started throwing stones on policemen, injuring at least 7 personnel, including me. We then resorted to mild lathicharge and fired some tear gas shells to control the situation. There are no reports of civilian injury yet,” said the SP, who remained stationed at the spot after getting first aid.

He claimed that unidentified persons in the rally resorted to violence after their leaders agreed to stop the rally at Sanand after being convinced by police.

“The rally consisted around 3,000 persons. We have detained around 15 persons involved in the violence. A formal FIR will be lodged in this regard at Sanand GIDC police station. The situation is totally under control,” added Asari.

Meanwhile, opposition Congress and Patel quota stir leader Hardik Patel criticised the police action to use force against farmers.

“Police thrashed innocent farmers at the behest of BJP-led Gujarat Government, which is known for suppressing people who raise their voices,” alleged Gujarat Congress spokesperson Manish Doshi.

“We condemn such atrocity on farmers, who were just demanding adequate water for their farmlands,” Doshi added.

In a statement, Hardik said BJP government is trying every trick in the book to retain power by terrorising people.

“Farmers were lathicharged for raising a legitimate demand. Such atrocities proves that this government is anti-farmer. It is their known method of being in power by terrorising people and suppress every voice of dissent. In coming days, farmers will take appropriate decision in this regard,” said the fire-brand leader.

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Image: bilkulonline.com
 
It is an interesting time politically in poll-driven Gujarat, the state that the RSS-driven Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has controlled, virtually un-contested from 1998. It is also been come to be regarded as prime minister Narendra Modi’s personal bastion, even as BJP stalwarts LK Advani and Keshubhai Patel also contributed significantly to the saffron turnaround of the state.
 
Monday, January 2, was the final day of the Khedut Vedna Yatra (A footmarch to highlight farmers’ distress in Gujarat), when determined Gujarati farmers marched 450 kilometres on foot led by Sagar Rabari and Pinakin Dhamelia of Khedut Samaj-Gujarat. Eighteen hundred 2000 farmers from Gir, Junagadh, Rajkot, Bhavnagar, Botad, Surendranagar, Ahmedabad, Banakantha, Aravali Bardoli and Surat districts joined them at Vaishnodevi circle to march towards Gandhinagar. This is not an insignificant number.
 
The farmers marched in a disciplined manner in a file of 2. They were stopped by the police near village Tarapur. They were told that the CM would not be available but an officer would come to them to receive the memoranda and a meeting with the CM would be fixed in the coming 4-5 days.
 
Ironically for the farmers, the VGGS – the land and water-guzzling monster and their nemesis – is the reason why no one, beginning with the CM and the senior ministers or the senior officers, has any time to spare to listen to the farmers or their vedna. A copy of the memorandum may be read here.
 
The farmers have demanded that Gujarat CM –Vijay Rupani, a replacement for the Modi-favourite Anandibeh Patel unseated after the Una agitation in August last year –meet them within the next three to four days.
 
Protesting peacefully, the farmers still retain the vain hope that the state government will not only meet them but will also meet their long-standing demands. If the government however fails to keep its promise, they are faced with a dilemma, Where does the agitation go from here?
 
The farmers have employed all possible democratic means – rallies, demonstrations, fasts, foot marches – to raise their issues.
 
Boycott Ruling Party Reps in coming polls if Farmer Demands Not met
If the government breaks its promise once again, what then? In that case, the farmers have decided to employ the ultimate weapon in a democracy – their franchise. Farmer representatives and leaders will tour villages and districts to relate the tale of government neglect and breach of promise. They will then proclaim to the people: “Vote for anyone except the present regime which has worked to destroy farmers and agriculture” and
 
“Do not allow the representatives of the present regime to enter the villages for canvassing”. The farmers will be left with no option but to remove, by root and limb, the drunk-on-power present regime.
 
The protest gathering has dispersed with a solemn vow to combat this anti-farmer regime and to put their might behind this task.

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