After a hiatus of more than four decades, the historic green revolution, which once made India self reliant in food production, appears to be unfolding yet again. It almost appeared as if the day is not too far when all of us use vegetables and fruits that are free from pesticides or chemicals in our kitchen.
More than 20,000 farmers from different parts of the state assembled in the IT city on Monday, just to pledge that they would not commit suicide and take to organic farming and spread the same message among other farmers of the state too. The programme- ‘Krishi Chiatanya Samavesha’ considered to be first of its kind in the country, organised in front of Vidhana Soudha, witnessed the prescence of more than 20,000 farmers who pledged their support to the government in popularising organic farming.
Farmers, in prescence of former President A P J Abdul Kalam and harbinger of organic farming in the state, Meeratayi Koppikar who has been practising organic farming for the last 20 years, promissed that they will not poison the mother earth and will not pollute it from pesticides, chemical fertilizers and create awareness among farmers to use organic methods of agriculture.
Overwhelmed by the stupendous response from the farming community of the state who had come to the city in their own money, Chief Minister B S Yeddyurappa who swore in the name of farmers at the same venue eight months ago, announced that he will visit the house of every organic farmer once in a month and draw inspiration from them. “Every month I will spend couple of hours with the family of the farmers practising organic farming and share their experiences. On seeing all of you in huge numbers, I am convinced that together we can change the picture of agriculture in the state,” CM said.
Recalling the support of farmers at the time of withstanding the global sanctions against the nuclear test, former President A P J Abdul Kalam said, “We have already made inroads into global organic market with the production of Coffee, Tea, fruits, vegetables and Cotton and a change is fast sweeping over in many states where farmers are cutting down on pesticide usage.”
Illustrating the inventions by National Innovation Foundation, Kalam said, “By adopting multicroping under organic farming farmers can fight plant diseases. Growing of Lady’s-finger would prevent diseases in Cotton. In Kerala farmers have grown paddy in wetland areas in organic method and got increased yield. Similarly, farmers in Karnataka too achieve success.”
Decision by the farmers
I shall not poison the Earth and I shall not pollute its gifts from chemical fertilizers
I shall love the life of farming and never resort to suicide
I shall not look to others for seeds and remain self dependent
I shall not create non-degradable waste, preserve and enrich nature.
Organic meet turns inorganic!
It was a sheer Irony that the Vidhana Soudha which was reverberated on Monday evening with the slogans and loud talk on organic farming, the same venue turned ‘inorganic’ within a few minutes of the function. With more than 20,000 farmers flooding the Ambedkar Veedhi between Vidhana Soudha and High Court, the gardens and boulevard, literally became the garbage dump yard. In-organic and non-biodegradable materials like plastic water bottles, buttermilk packets, sweet packets were found littered all around. A pledge to safeguard the earth went in vain within a few minutes of swearing-in. Later for the civic workers it took more than three hours to clean the entire area.
