In a relief to farmers ahead of cotton procurement season, about 140 cotton ginners in Haryana today called off their month-long strike.

The strike has been withdrawn by cotton ginners after Haryana Chief Minister, Mr Bhupinder Singh Hooda assured them to look into their demands after by-election in Hisar on October 13.

“We have decided to call off our strike as Haryana CM has assured us to consider our demands sympathetically,” Mr Sushil Mittal, President, Haryana Cotton Ginners Association said today.

A delegation of cotton ginners met Mr Hooda yesterday to draw his attention towards their problems.

Cotton ginners are seeking reduction in market fee and rural development fund from 4 per cent to 1 per cent in order to bring charges on par with rates prevailing in neighbouring states. Punjab and Rajasthan levy 2 per cent and 1.60 per cent as market fee and rural development fund on cotton respectively.

Cotton ginners are also demanding rationalisation of VAT on cotton by ensuring refund of excess tax on inter state sale in a time bound manner.

After ginners went on strike, cotton growers in Haryana were forced to either offload their crop in neighbouring markets of Punjab or store it at their homes.

The cotton ginners today said farmers have started bringing their crop to mandis for sale, though crop contains higher moisture content of 20-30 per cent because of rains lashed in the month of September.

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