BAHAWALPUR: Speakers at a `Cholistan conference` have voiced criticism against corporate farming, which they claimed, aimed at depriving the Seraiki and Sindhi people of their thousands of acres of lands of their ancestors.

The Cholistan conference was organised on Monday by Communist Party of Pakistan at Chak No. 21 Bangla Mithra bridge, a threshold of Cholistan desert near Yazman in Bahawalpur district, to protest against corporate farming and the construction of new canals.

According to a press release, the main speakers included Imdad Qazi, secretary of Communist Party of Pakistan, Noor Ahmed Katiyar, senior VP ofAwami Tehreek, Lal Shah, general secretary of Awami Jamhoori Party, Malik Allah Nawaz Waince, president of Seraiki Party, Abdul Q ayyum, president of Pakistan Seraiki Party (farming wing), Hakim Gul Bahar, general secretary of Bahali-i-Haqooq Cholistan, Jam Azhar of Seraiki Foundation and Mir Munawar, president of Sindh Hari Committee.

The speakers said the corporate farming projects were a conspiracy to take land away from the Seraiki and Sindhi people and render them landless in their own homeland. They expressed concern that under corporate farming as many as 6.7 million and over 1.3 million acres of land in Cholistan and Sindh, respectively, was being handed over to (foreign) Arab countries and multinational companies.They said in the name of `Green Pakistan Initiative`, people were denied the water of the Indus River as droughtlike situation already existed in Sindh and people do not have potable water.

Due to no water release from Kotri Barrage, over 4 million acres of land in Thatta, Sujawal, and Badin districts have been lost to sea intrusion.

They blamed PPP, PML-N, and Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf for being part of this `conspiracy` and alleged that President Zardari approved the canal projects while former president Arif Alvi signed the Investment Board Amendment Bill 2023, giving legal cover to SIFC and corporate farming.

They announced that the Sindhi and Seraiki people would never accept these `black` laws. They urged the civil society groups and intellectuals across the coun-try to play their key role in waging the struggle against corporate farming.

The press release said the large public gathering raised slogans against the occupation of Cholistan lands and the extraction of six new canals from the Indus.

A resolution adopted at the conference demanded the cancellation of Investment Board Bill 2023, which legitimised `illegal institutions` such as corporate farming and the SIFC. It was also demanded that the support price of wheat be fixed at Rs4,000 per 40 kg.

The release added that by another resolution it was demanded that the lands of the Seraiki region, Sindh, Balochistan, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and GilgitBaltistan be given to local farmers men and women instead of foreign multinational companies.