Farmers protested at the Primary Agricultural Cooperative Society in Nizamabad district’s Mortad mandal headquarters on Saturday. They were upset because they felt that the society was taking advantage of them in the name of “Kadata”. This is a charge that farmers have to pay, supposedly for porter charges, but the farmers claim that it is just a way for the society to extort more money from them.
The farmers had sold paddy to the society two days previously, but the grain was sent to the rice mill of PACS governing body. The millers took it and the society staff and chairman said that the rice miller was asking for “Kadtata”. The farmers were not happy when the PACS governing body said that they would invite the farmers to the society on the issue of ‘kadatha’ and impose a cash cut of 40,000 to the lorries.
The farmers went to the society along with their waybills, showing that they had already paid for their porter charges. They expressed their anger and accused the society of fraud, saying that the chairman and staff were deliberately deceiving them and illegally taking their money. They claimed that over the past three years, the society chairman and millers had colluded to loot the farmers’ money up to Rs 40,000/- per lorry load, amounting to a total of Rs 36.52 crore.
The farmers demanded full recovery of their money and wanted to reveal total load calculations on a lorry basis. They protested that they would not leave the society until all the farmers who had lost money were paid. A “Cooking Warpu” program was organized by the farmers, who claimed that such illegalities were happening in many other societies as well.
