Lok Satta chief held in K'taka

Lok Satta president and Kukatpalli MLA Jayaprakash Narayan was taken into custody by the Karnataka Police on Sunday on the Andhra  Pradesh-Karnataka border for his attempt to cross the border with a sack of rice and symbolically trying to sell it in protest against the alleged “draconian” law which forbade inter-state movement of food grains.

Speaking to reporters in the border town of Chetnepalli in the Kolar district he said that the 65-year-old “draconian law” had to be amended in order to give relief to the farmers. The “Padayatra” of the Lok Satta president began at Emmiganoor in the Kurnool district. It was meant to register protest against the government’s limitation preventing farmers to sell their production in other states. It received spontaneous public response as the farmers joined his rally in 70 bullock carts on Sunday.

Meanwhile, he said that in Andhra more than 55 per cent of the population depend on farming but their income is 1/8th of any other occupation. Average income for a working family is 40,000 while the average income for a farming family is 5,000 lowest possible income for any occupation. He said the government collects Rs 2000 cr in taxes on paddy alone but doesn't spend this productively to improve seed quality or other measures.

Next week, Lok Satta is planning to take rice to other border towns in the state to cross into Nanded in Maharashtra from Nizamabad and Odisha from Srikakulam and to Dharmapuri in TN. Activists joined the party chief in their “Padayatra” and sold food grains and rice in Karnataka. Office bearers of the Karnataka branch of Lok Satta paid Rs 1 lakh and purchased the rice carried by him and his party.