The sugarcane raisers protest, taken out from Hyderabad to Karachi against the non-implementation of sugarcane rate of Rs182 per 40kg, heavy contingents of police stopped them at Fawara Chowk from proceeding towards the Sindh Assembly.
Around 2000 sugarcane growers, including females, under the banner of Sindh Agriculture Research Council (SARC) and led by council leaders Ali Palah and Jamal Mehmood Khuhro, reached Karachi Press Club where they held a protest demonstration and pursed to proceed towards the Sindh Assembly.
The government counselor contacted with the protestors and arranged a meeting with Sindh ministers Nasir Hussain Shah and Ismael Rahu, and Sindh Agriculture Secretary,” SARC leader Jamal Mehmood Khuhro.
The growers’ delegation comprising eight SARC leaders held a meeting with the two ministers and the secretary and presented them their contract of demands. The ministers guaranteed the entrustment that sugarcane rate of Rs182 per 40kg would be implemented within a week.
Afterward, the sugarcane growers withdrew the protest. Conversely, Khuhro added that they would recommence the protest in case of empty promises. The sugar mills in Sindh had started work late while the millers were not paying the rates announced by the government, both pressure strategies to make more profit while growers suffer.
Rs130 per 40kg rate of sugarcane was being paid as compared to Rs182 official rate, which was an immense injustice with them. Growers suffered heavy losses last year and added that the prices of fertilizer and cost of labor had risen to a high level; therefore, the government should vault millers to pay the Rs182 rate with instant effect.