ANANTAPUR: State president of Andhra Pradesh Rythu Sangham K. Ramakrishna has criticised the attitude of the State Government in threatening the farmers with withdrawing free power supply to their farm connections if they failed to install foot valves and capacitors.

It amounted to holding the farmers to ransom, he said while talking to newspersons here on Tuesday. He urged Chief Minister Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy and Agriculture Minister N. Raghuveera Reddy to stop threatening the farmers and instead take up the responsibility of providing foot valves and capacitors at least to the small and marginal farmers.

The small and marginal farmers were not in a position to bear the expenditure for fixing the foot valves and capacitors to their pumpsets due to losses suffered in agriculture, Mr. Ramakrishna explained. The APRS would stage protests in front of Transco offices in all districts on February 18 demanding uninterrupted nine-hour supply to the farm sector during day. Supply of power for seven hours in shifts during nights was creating a lot of problems to the farmers, he stated.

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