Mysuru: Former IAS officer Sasikanth Senthil while addressing a protest gathering of farmers warned the farmers of the consequences of such ordinances. Expressing his apprehension he said- These ordinances would result in these farmers turning landless and being reduced to mere farm laborers in the next five years.
Terming the amendments brought to the Karnataka Land Reforms Act as “damaging amendments” Senthil criticized the state government for taking the ordinance route for effecting the amendments.
Sasikanth Senthil was addressing the launch of the statewide awareness campaign organised to protest against the amendment under the banner of “Bhoomi Mattu Vasati Hakku Vanchita Horata Samiti” ( The movement for landless and shelter) near the resting place of Devaraj Urs at Hunsur in Mysuru.
The land reforms brought by the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party government in the state were highly detrimental and would spell doom on the farmers particularly marginal and with small landholdings.
The repealing of important sections of the Act that guaranteed rights of land ownership to the landless will allow non-agriculturists to buy farmland and remove the existing ceiling limit on ownership and was done only to favor the capitalist and industrialist.
The government is subverting the democratic process and also subverting the aspirations of the Karnataka Land Reforms Act. It had brought amendments to key laws governing land acquisition in the absence of any discussion debate and without availing the public opinion taking advantage of the Pandemic. The government misusing the COVID19 crisis when people’s hands and mouth were tied is unfortunate.
Recalling revolutionary contributions, Senthil said former chief minister Urs the champion of land reforms had made tillers as the owner of the land which had ensured farmers to lead proud and respectable lives even in the 21st century. The law helped countless landless laborers who were toiling for a meager amount in the fields of other farmers become farmers by having their own land. The Act is based on the principle of “land belongs to the tiller’. This is a bold step. Such a law does not exist anywhere in the country. We have to be proud of such a law.
But the BJP government had overturned such significant reforms to favor the haves to help them own lands. Senthil, who condemned the functioning and opposing the anti-people policies of the centre had resigned from his post said that the reforms brought to the land reforms act were totally unacceptable. “No government had dared to bring such sweeping changes in the post-independence era” he rued.
“I am of the apprehensive that there would be hardly one or two acres or any land left for the farmers in a few years from now and it would not be a surprise to see farmers working as laborers in their own land” he stated and called upon people to fight to retain the essence in the Land Reforms Act.
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