PRESS RELEASE

Date: August

1, 2015

Agriculture is the mainstay of Telangana society but has been in crisis for the past
two decades. This is starkly visible in the fact that 28,000 farmers have committed
suicide in the past 20 years. Today, Telangana has the highest number of farmer
suicides per capita in the country. Lakhs of farmers are continuing to suffer with
debt burden, crop failure, lack of remunerative prices, high private investment into
borewells, and lack of support systems from the government.
This crisis of the farming community is a policy-driven crisis. Though the
governments have changed and different parties have been in power, the
government policies have been such that farmers livelihoods have been consigned
to low priority with the underlying push towards corporate-controlled agriculture.
Due to this, the farming community is unable to come out of the crisis and the
farmer suicides are continuing.
In this context, several farmer organizations, activists, intellectuals and scientists
have come together for a united struggle to address the farmers issues in
Telangana, and form the Telangana Rythu J.A.C. The main aim of the Rythu JAC is
to build a united movement to address the problems of the farming community
and to build a Telangana which is free of farmer suicides.
Objectives of JAC
1. Policy changes which protect agricultural community from corporate
domination, and ensure them assured income.
2. Support for agricultural methods which conserve the soil, water, farm ecology,
biodiversity and environment.
3. Ensure the rights of farming community including adivasis over the natural
resources, especially land, water, forests and seed.
4. Prevent farmers distress and suicides.
Action Program
Beginning from the first week of August, the Telangana Rythuu JAC will visit
drought-affected villages, farmer suicide families and mobilize farmers for solving
immediate problems. Rythu JAC places the following immediate demands before
the Telangana government.
Immediate Demands

1. The compensation for Farmer Suicide families should be increased to Rs.5 lakhs.
The ongoing farmer suicides should be recognized with minimum delay and the
families should be provided with ex-gratia, loan waiver, medical and education
facilities and livelihood opportunities.
2. Immediate crop compensation should be issued to all farmers who suffered crop
loss in the past one year due to drought, hailstorms and unseasonal rainfall. In
the current season with erratic monsoon and deficient rainfall, immediate steps
should be taken to protect farmers.
3. The banks should treat all the outstanding loans of farmers eligible for loan
waiver as the responsibility of the government, and waive the loans from the
farmers accounts. Full crop loans as per scale finance should be immediately
issued to all farmers including tenant farmers.
Rythu JAC Ad-hoc Committee
An ad-hoc committee has been formed for coordinating the activities of the
Telangana Rythu JAC under the convenorship of Prof. L. Jalapathi Rao, eminent
agricultural scientist who has been working for farmers cause for a long time. The
list of Ad-hoc committee members is being released to the media.
Telangana Rythu JAC Ad-hoc Committee Members
N
o.
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2
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4
5
6
7
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10
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Name

Organization

Prof. L. Jalapathi Rao

Prof. M. Kodandram
Prof. K.R.Chowdhry
Prof. Althas Janaiah
Dr. G.V.Ramanjaneyulu
Dr. Usha Seethalakshmi
Ravi Kanneganti
Kirankumar Vissa
Sridhar Reddy
Varyada Anji Reddy
K. Achyutha Rama Rao
Mandala Venkanna
Pakala Srihari Rao
P. Shankar
Mortala Chandar Rao
Maccha Vidyasagar Rao
Narsimha Reddy
Gurijala Ravindar Rao
Venkat Reddy
Ashalatha
Narsimha Naidu
Ashok Kumar
Sadananda Rao
Nynala Govardhan
Vithal Rao Arya

Convenor Telangana Rythu JAC

Rythu JAC
Rythu JAC
Rythu JAC
Rythu JAC
Rythu Swarajya Vedika
Rythu Swarajya Vedika
Rythu Swarajya Vedika
Bharatiya Kisan Sangh
Bharatiya Kisan Sangh
All India Kisan Mazdoor Sabha
All India Kisan Mazdoor Sabha
Telangana Rythu Rakshana Samiti
Dalit Bahujan Front
Telangana Rythu Sangham
Telangana Rythanga Samiti
Telangana Rythanga Samiti
Telangana Vidyavantula Vedika
Telangana Rashtra Rythu Aikya Vedika
Mahila Kisan Adhikar Manch
Pasupu Rythula Sangham
Deputy Director, Agriculture (Retd)
Ex-MLA, Nalgonda district
Telangana Jala Sadhana Samiti
Arya Samaj

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27

K. Parvatalu
Kanakavva

Dalit Bahujan Coolie Rythu Sangham

Rythu Aatmahatya Badhita Kutumbala
Vedika

Issued by: Prof. L. Jalapathi Rao, Convenor, Telangana Rythu JAC

For more details, contact: Vissa Kirankumar: 9701705743, Kanneganti Ravi:
9912928422