Name of the Newest Farmer: Rani Mukherjee

Farmers in India are in trouble again. If you are a farmer but look either well-fed or attractive, the whole system would be against you!

According to the latest news, an Ahmednagar judge has issued a notice asking a nice-looking charming lady farmer named Rani Mukherjee to prove that she is of farming stock, a prerequisite for owning land in the district. An outdated and outrageous bylaw of the state prohibits agricultural land from being transferred outright to non-farmers, which we all know the lady is certainly not. The farmer, Rani Mukherjee, bought the property near Ahmednagar, where she regularly attends prayers at the Shirdi Sai Baba mandir and sometimes dances or sings for rain and/or good crop.

Other very handsome farmers, Amitabh Bachchan and Aamir Khan, had similar unjustified cases pending against them. We are all too aware of the plight of these two responsible citizens of India.

Not being able to fight the corrupt system, the farmer, Bachchan had to abandon claims on his farmland in Barabanki in Uttar Pradesh. Still the heartless Uttar Pradesh government said it would pursue the forgery case against him. Sailesh Krishna, principal secretary to Chief Minister Mayawati told, "The administration did detect a fraud and forgery in the allotment of gram sabha land. And the beneficiary was none other than (Amitabh) Bachchan."

The officer also went too far to spoil the future of poor Bachchan. Mr. Khanna, while dismissing the farmer's plea before the Allahabad High Court that he was willing to forego his claim on land in Barabanki district also questioned the authority of lawyer of gram sabha of Daulatpur to exonerate Bachchan if he donated the land. He categorically stated that returning the land doesn't exonerate the farmer.

In a country whose economy depends so much on farming and farmers, it's sad for us to note the above trend in our system. We hope Mumbai, India's economy capital, should show the path for farmers' freedom from the clutches of the political and judiciary system. We hope more and more farmers would come out of the most sought-after areas of the city and lead a march to Allahabad or Ahmednagar or wherever it is ... to lead a nationwide protest against such government atrocities.