Social media savvy Maha onion farmers tip scales against NDA
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«Now they are collecting a tax of 40% on the onions we are exporting. This is worse than the British Raj. Isn't this a loot of farmers?» he demanded.
The question was posed on the Facebook page of the Maharashtra Kanda Utpadak Sanghatana (Maharashtra Onion Growers' Association), which has 150,000 followers.
Social media has been used to organise farmers effectively in a region where the ruling coalition suffered losses in the just-concluded general election.
Maharashtra's onion farmers were first mobilised by the late farmers' leader Sharad Joshi in 1978 when an export ban had pushed prices down to 7 paise per kg. He had led road and rail blockades at the time to protest against the Centre's policies.
However, when Bharat Dighole felt the need to rally onion farmers in 2015, the methods he used were different. «We have never staged a rasta roko-it just ends up becoming local news,» said Dighole, an onion farmer from Sinnar near Nashik.
Instead, his association started forming WhatsApp groups and began disseminating daily rates of onions in different markets.
Over the years, the number of WhatsApp groups have swelled to 200, he said. In addition, there are another 250-300 WhatsApp groups started by the second and third layer of leaders in his association at the block and district levels. Then
