ON June 20, 2022, the AIKS Nashik district council held a massive 25,000-strong rally on the divisional commissioner's office at Nashik. Thousands of adivasi peasants had come from all 15 tehsils of the district. They included thousands of women and youth.

The call for this rally had been given at the AIKS Martyrs' Day public meeting of 10,000 peasants held on June 12 at Umbarthan in Surgana tehsil of Nashik district (covered in these columns earlier). 

The main issues of the June 20 Nashik rally were the stringent implementation of the Forest Rights Act (FRA) which is still extremely unsatisfactory even 16 years after the FRA was passed in 2006; scrapping of the proposed river linking scheme of the Modi regime which will submerge several adivasi villages in some districts in Maharashtra and Gujarat; demand for proper implementation of the PM Awaas Yojana (housing scheme), from which lakhs of applicants have been left out, and increase in the amount of the scheme to Rs 3 lakh per house; remunerative MSP to all crops and their procurement, with the price of onions in Nashik district having recently plummeted; expansion of MGNREGA; and other demands.

After the historic AIKS-led Kisan Long March from Nashik to Mumbai in March 2018, the state government was forced to speed up the implementation of the Forest Rights Act (FRA), especially in districts like Nashik, Thane-Palghar and Ahmednagar, where the AIKS has led a constant struggle. However, tens of thousands of claims of adivasi peasants are still pending. In thousands of cases, the size of the forest land pattas given are far less than what the peasants have been cultivating for generations. Worse still, in the 7/12 land records even in cases where land pattas have been given, the owner is still shown as the forest department and the peasants’ names are included in the column of ‘other rights’. The quality of land in these records is shown as ‘uncultivable’, while the peasants have been actually taking crops from it for years. All this makes it impossible for the peasants to avail of any government schemes or bank loans.

Thousands of applicants have not been given houses under the PM Gharkul Scheme, in spite of meeting all the necessary requirements. The paltry amount sanctioned under the scheme is also not enough to construct a house. In spite of massive unemployment, the implementation of MGNREGA is extremely poor, due to lack of funds from the central government. The astronomical price rise of petrol, diesel and gas is hitting all sections of the people. These were some of the issues that were highlighted in the public meeting.          

Under the leadership of AIKS state vice president J P Gavit, ex-MLA, a delegation met the district collector, and held a discussion on the memorandum of demands. If these demands were not conceded, a warning was given to the government that the struggle would be intensified in the days ahead.

The huge public meeting that followed was presided over by AIKS president Ashok Dhawale, and it was addressed by J P Gavit, CITU vice president D L Karad, AIKS state president Kisan Gujar, CITU state vice president Sitaram Thombre, AIKS Nashik district leaders Savliram Pawar, Irfan Shaikh, Sunil Malusare, Subhash Choudhary, Bhika Rathod, and DYFI District president Indrajit Gavit.

Along with the main issues of the rally, the speakers came down heavily on the BJP central government and its anti-national and anti-youth Agnipath scheme, and its heinous communal and authoritarian conspiracies. Zilla parishad, panchayat samiti, municipal corporation and several gram panchayat elections will be held in Maharashtra in the next few months. All the speakers gave a clarion call to prepare for these elections in strength, with the twin objective of defeating the BJP and strengthening the Left and secular forces.