Fish workers' forum to take out protest march to Delhi

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The fishermen's community led by National Fish Workers Forum (NFF) will march to New Delhi as part of 'Parliament Chalo' agitation on April 22 in protest against the decreased allocation in the Union budget for fisheries sector. The community would demand to scrap Dr Meenakumari committee report and cancel all Letter of Permits (LoPs) given to the foreign fishing vessels.
"We hoped that the BJP-led government would fulfill our long standing demands as the BJP leaders had promised so during the election campaign. A separate ministry for the welfare of the community was also promised. During the presentation of the interim budget after the BJP budget came to power, we were assured that our demands will be taken care of. However, we are disappointed after the general budget presentation," NFF secretary T Peter said.
In fact, the allocation for fisheries is further reduced by Rs 10.16 crore.
The allocation was Rs 461.3 crore in 2014-15 and now it is only Rs 451.14 crore. Considering the fact that the fisheries contribute to about 0.7% of the national GDP, proportional allocation to the fisheries including both plan and non plan, should not be less than Rs. 12,000 crore. "The rightful allocation can be demanded justifiably when we have a ministry exclusively for us; we had been demanding for one," Peter said.
Over 500 representatives of the community will join the march to Delhi as part of the agitation. The decision was taken at a meeting in Mangaluru on Friday by the NFF office-bearers led by its chairperson M.Ilango.