Farmers to dump debt papers on new year's eve

With suicides by debt-ridden farmers continuing unabated, Kisan Coordination Committee (KCC) has come out with a "novel plan" to "bid goodbye" to debt by dumping loan documents in the sea here on the eve of the new year.

"We want to start our life in 2008 with absolutely no debt. We want to put an end to farmers' suicides," Govind Joshi, an executive member of KCC, told PTI here ahead of a planned farmers' rally on December 31 coinciding with the committee's executive meeting.

About 20,000 farmers from across the country are expected to converge here to take part in the "Karj Mukti" (liberation from the debt) agitation to "sink" the debt documents, he said.

Farmers from Punjab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Kerala and Tamil Nadu would participate, he said.

Rajya Sabha MP from Maharashtra Sharad Joshi and Bhupendar Singh Mann, President of KCC, would also attend the meet. "When the people welcome the New Year, we will be bidding goodbye to our debt," Gunvant Patil, another KCC executive member, said.

The KCC members alleged that lakhs of farmers in Tamil Nadu were still in debt as the government had written-off only the co-operative farm loans. The loans from nationalised banks were still pending.