Hundreds of thousands of Indian farmers are protesting against agricultural laws

MUZAFFARNAGAR, India, September 5 (Reuters) – Hundreds of thousands of farmers gathered on Sunday in India’s most populous state, Uttar Pradesh, the largest rally in a series of months of protests to press the government of Narendra Modi to repeal three new agricultural laws.

More than 500,000 farmers attended the rally in the town of Muzaffarnagar, according to local police.

The rally in Uttar Pradesh, a predominantly agricultural state with 240 million people, will give new life to the protest movement, said Rakesh Tikait, a prominent farmer leader.

“We will intensify our protest by going to all the cities and towns of Uttar Pradesh to convey the message that the Modi government is anti-farmer,” he added.

Over the past eight months, tens of thousands of farmers have camped on major roads to the capital, New Delhi, to oppose the laws, in protest of India’s oldest farmers against the government.

The measures, introduced last September, allow farmers to sell their products directly, outside of government-regulated wholesale markets, to large buyers. The government says this will slow farmers down and help them get better prices.

Farmers, however, say the legislation will harm their livelihoods and leave them with little bargaining power against large private retailers and food processors.

Agriculture is a vast sector that supports almost half of India’s more than 1.3 billion people and accounts for approximately 15% of the country’s $ 2.7 trillion economy.

Balbir Singh Rajewal, another farmer leader, said Sunday’s rally was a warning to Prime Minister Modi and his party Bharatiya Janata, that next year they will contest state assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh, often considered a barometer of the federal government’s popularity. .

“Our message is very clear, either by repealing the laws or facing defeat in the state elections,” he added.

Reports from Mayank Bhardwaj to Muzaffarnagar; Additional reports from Saurabh Sharma in Lucknow and Shilpa Jamkhandikar in Mumbai; Edited by Pravin Char

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