Baloch demands agri inputs GST free

Lahore : Secretary General, Jamaat e Islami, Liaqat Baloch, has called upon the government to exempt the agricultural inputs from the GST and to fix the procurement prices of major crops in consultation with the growers.

Addressing the JI committee on agriculture at Mansoora on Sunday, he stressed that electricity should be provided to the agricultural tube wells on flat rates in the Punjab, Sindh and Khyber P, as had already been done in Balochistan. All land records should be computerized, the payments to the sugar cane growers by the sugar mills should be made through cheques. The fertilizer companies should be bound to print the prices of the commodity at the bags, he said.

Liaqat Baloch also urged the government to raise the issue of India’s water terrorism at the International Court of Justice as also at the diplomatic level.

The JI central leader said that in the past, agriculture had been contributing up to 68 per cent of the total produce of the country which had however come down to only 25 per cent because of the wrong and anti grower policies of different governments. The present PML(N) government too had levied tax on agriculture only to oblige a particular lobby. He said, a majority of the elected representatives who belonged to the rural areas had added to the problems of the farmers community.

Liaqat Baloch also urged the government to make honest efforts for building new water reservoirs by taking its allies into confidence as this had become unavoidable.