Veteran NCP leader Sharad Pawar on Monday joined the onion growers in their massive protest organised in Nashik demanding the revocation of the ban on the exports of onion and highlighting other peasant issues, even as the Opposition Maharashtra Vikas Aghadi (MVA) staged a vociferous protest in Nagpur to demand that the onion growers be allowed to export their produce.

In what came as a big boost for the agitating onion growers, 84-year-old Pawar drove down to Chandwad in Nashik district in north Maharashtra which is one of the onion-growing hubs, and threw his weight behind the farmers who have for some time been demanding the revocation of the ban on onion exports.

Hitting out at the Modi government for its “anti-farmer” policies, the NCP president said: “The onion prices have crashed across the country following the Centre’s ban on the export of the produce. This has led to anger among the farming community. Owing to the Centre’s anti-farmer polices, the tillers are not  getting remunerative prices for their produce”

Pawar said that the farmers had been forced to take to streets to register their anger. “We have no interest whatsoever in undertaking such agitations. But, we have do it because till we hit the streets, the government will not  take note of your problems”

Recalling that when he was the Agriculture Minister (May 2004-May 2014) he had clearly assured the farmers that the prices of onion would not be allowed to fall, Pawar said that the Modi government had precisely done that, as a result the onion prices were crashing in the markets.