 Hello and welcome to newsclick.in. We are standing at Jantar Mantar. You can see behind me the farmers from Kerala and Himachal Pradesh have gathered here to protest against the human-animal conflict going on in these states. The farmers have said, in this year 66 farmers have been killed due to the wildlife attacks. And in the last one decade, around a thousand farmers have died because of this. We spoke to the farmers and the farm leaders who are protesting with their demands, and listened to what they have to say in this video of newsclick.in. Today, on behalf of the Kerala unit of the AIKS, All India Kisan Sabha, hundreds of farmers have come here to Delhi in a march to parliament. They are all waiting here at the Jantar Mantar. And the main issue that they have highlighted is this question of the wild animal menace. In such a situation, where also crores of rupees of crops have been lost because of these wild animal attacks, so today they came to parliament, to Delhi, 3,000 kilometers away to raise these issues. In all over India, there is a problem, either elephant or wild boar or monkey or elephant or this nil guy, different animal in different states, they are entering into the field and destroying the crops, that is the problem. We are fighting all India Kisan Sabha from the beginning, last few years, we are raising the demand. After a lot of demands and fighting in Himachal Pradesh, they have given the right to kill some monkey. Come, but other places, this is a big problem, Kerala, you know, elephant, elephants are coming in big number and entering in the locality, destroying the houses and they are all killing people and injuring people and lot of crops are being destroyed, crops and the field are destroyed. This is a very permanent problem in Kerala. In Himachal Pradesh, in 2008-2009, people came from the monkeys and fought in Andolan and they got permission for a scientific killing and this permission lasted for 2-3 years. After that, a NGO went to High Court and the government took a different path, a park where monkeys can be caught and they can be eaten, which was tried in this way but it was also successful. On the one hand, Kisan has wild boars and wild boars and even the wild boar, the wild boars are being killed. On the other hand, for the projects of land, for the stores, the jungle is being cut and the tribal area is being deforestationed. For the towers of JP Company, 10,000 trees have been cut and the habitation has been destroyed. As far as the security of Kisan is concerned, the government is not working on it and the government says that it is a central act and we cannot do anything about it. We have also run a park with people in Himachal Pradesh and this is Andolan and in this, the demand for farmers in Himachal Pradesh is very high because we face this problem and support it. Today morning, before this dharana started, we met the Union Minister for Environment and Forests, Mr. Bhupendra Yadav. We submitted a memorandum to him regarding our main demands. Some of the demands he has conceded and he has said that he will begin immediate implementation about them. Now, first time before coming to those demands, I would like to stress that this wild animal menace is not a problem of Kerala alone. It is a problem of all over India. So today, the issues that we raised with the minister and which we are raising today here in this dharana are important pro-farmer amendments to the Wildlife Protection Act of 1972, to the Forest Conservation Act, to the Schedule Trice Protection Act, to the Indian Forest Act. Secondly, in Kerala, in the specific situation there we have said that trenches should be dug at the same time where that is not possible. Barbed wire fences of at least four meters have to be constructed where that is not possible. Concrete walls have to be built to keep out wild animals from entering the revenue areas that is the villages. Now this work can be very gainfully done through the Manrega, which is a very important scheme. And if this can be done, then a large part of the population, 30 lakh people in Kerala alone are affected. So they can be saved from the wild animal danger. Third thing is in forestation, commercial forestation is being done. Instead of the normal forestation and that prevents fodder and water to the wild animals. So therefore we have said this commercial forestation must be stopped and natural forests must be encouraged. Another thing that we have demanded, they should increase the compensation paid to the dependents of those who are killed by wild animals from the present 5 lakh to 50 lakh rupees and to those injured to 10 lakh rupees. On 31st, the Samyukesan Morcha has given a call to ensure that the demand of the farmers for the minimum support price as per the Swaminathan Commission recommendations are implemented and for other demands. Today when the central government, Narendra Modi and his government are from 2014 speaking about doubling farmers incomes, actually farmers incomes are getting drastically reduced in a day on an average farmers are earning from cultivation of crops only 27 rupees. Wild animal menace and the menace of the stray cattle is leading to further losses of income. So this is a demand on which farmers across the country are concerned and we are going to in coming days go ahead for a national convention and unite farmers across the country to address this problem faced by the farmers. This is very much a part of the livelihood issue of farmers of our country and we are going to take it to its logical conclusion.