People's Democracy

MEETING at Kolkata, January 3, the Central Kisan Committee (CKC) of the All India Kisan Sabha (AIKS) made the following decisions.

1) Membership enrolment has to be completed within the stipulated time, that is, by April 30, and the affiliation fee has to be deposited to the AIKS centre by May 31. The AIKS state committees will plan enrolment fortnights in two instalments to achieve the target. This campaign will be followed by unit, mandal and district conferences, as this year’s membership will be the main basis for state conferences and the next all-India conference to be held before March 2003.

According to the statewise membership figures released by the AIKS, the total membership of the organisation in 2000-2001 was 1,46,86,579 as against 1,45,94,403 in 1999-2000. The target for 2001-2002 has been fixed at 1,67,95,000.

2) Holding extended meetings, each state committee will prepare a paper on the agrarian situation in that state, and also an annual plan for organisational tasks and agitations. These draft papers have to be sent to the AIKS centre that will help in finalising them.

3) The states having a sizeable tribal population will organise tribal conventions, so as to concretise their burning demands. If held at the earliest, these conventions may help in organising an all-India tribal convention.

4) To protect the interests of peasant producers, particularly the poor and middle peasants, and sharecroppers, the AIKS units must take initiative to organise campaigns, movements and conventions on issues like declining prices of particular agricultural produce, MSP, procurement, marketing, storage, etc. According to the situation prevailing in the particular region, they must also raise issues related to infrastructure and inputs, like irrigation, power, fertilisers, pesticides, etc, required to increase production and productivity. They must thus fight for remunerative prices for the peasantry.

All steps have to be taken to protect the interest of peasants in general in the wake of attacks from the WTO-dictated policy of liberalisation.

5) To improve the quality and circulation of the AIKS Bulletin, state committees will take suitable steps to send their review reports, experiences of various movements, and also order for an increased number of copies.

Apart from the AIKS president S Ramachandran Pillai and general secretary K Varadha Rajan the CKC meeting was also attended by Harkishan Singh Surjeet, Benoy Konar, Mahboob Zahedi, S Malla Reddy and N K Shukla.