BJP president Rajnath Singh urged PM Manmohan Singh to take up the issue of Chinese restrictions on cotton imports from India to that country. The Prime Minister is going to China on Saturday on an official visit. The BJP president made this demand during a two-day Kissan Yatra in Vidarbha region of Maharashtra, where cotton farmers are facing bad times.

“The Chinese Government is not allowing free trade in cotton and imposing undeclared restrictions through backdoor on Indian cotton exports. Cotton farmers in India are suffering because of this. The PM must take up this issue during his talks with Chinese authorities,” he said, quoting a Xinhua report of December 2007 that said that Chinese authorities were curtailing cotton from India.

Singh demanded that India should increase its import tariff on cotton from the present 10 per cent to help the farmers in distress. He claimed that the Finance Minister had promised such measures, but never implemented them.

Singh said the current practice of keeping land as collateral against loans to buy farm implements, such as tractors, must end and the farmers should have access to loans at 4 per cent interest rate from all financial institutions. Also, farmers should be provided pensions, he demanded and promised that if his party came to power it will ensure that such schemes are implemented.

BJP leaders Nitin Gadkare, Gopinath Munde and Eknath Khadse travelled with the national president.