PM to address farmers' rally in Muktsar tomorrow, security beefed up

The Punjab police has beefed up security in the state's Muktsar district where Prime Minister Narendra Modi is to address a 'thanksgiving' rally of farmers tomorrow, to be organised jointly by the SAD and the BJP in the wake of recent hike in MSP of Kharif crops.

The rally, which will be held to mark the "unprecedented" increase in the Minimum Support Price of Kharif crops, will be organized at Malout in Muktsar.

"Adequate security arrangements have been made for the PM's rally," said Punjab Director General of Police (Law & Order) H S Dhillon here today.

An officer of the rank of additional director general of police, four inspector generals, 12 senior superintendents of police and sizable number of police personnel have been deputed for the rally, official said.

ADGP (Provisioning) Arpit Shukla, IG (Ferozepur Range) Gurinder Singh Dhillon, IG (Bathinda Range) M F Farooqui, IG (Patiala Range) A S Rai and IG (IRB) A S Chahal have been assigned respective duties in light of the rally.

Punjab DGP Suresh Arora and DGP (Intelligence) Dinkar Gupta today reviewed the security arrangements at Muktsar, said Dhillon.

The SAD and its ally BJP are jointly organizing a 'thanksgiving' rally at Malout.

The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA) at its meeting on July 4 had approved the MSP of 14 Kharif (summer-sown) crops. MSP for paddy was hiked by a steep Rs 200 per quintal.

After the hike, the MSP of paddy (common grade) was Rs 1,750 per quintal for 2018-19 season and the support price of Grade A variety of paddy was Rs 1,770.

The SAD president Sukhbir Singh Badal had earlier said that farmers from Punjab, Haryana and Rajasthan would attend the rally and they would give a rousing welcome to the Prime Minister for his "bold and decisive" step to implement the Swaminathan Commission report which called for 50 per cent profit on input cost.

Sukhbir had also said that the Rs 200 per quintal increase in paddy would result in an increase of Rs 6,000 per acre to every paddy grower.