disciplined manner. They had no clue about the animosity between Shiv Sena and Kamgar Aghadi. Samant was never happy about Bhujbal being invited but Joshi was insistent. Bhujbal himself was not happy those days within Shiv Sena rank but officially he continued to be a part of it. Perhaps by attending this gathering, for which Balasaheb had refused to come, Bhujbal was showing his displeasure with Balasaheb and his independent mind. Fed up by those murdabad slogans, Bhujbal left the stage after his initial speech of welcome. After he had left Dr samant arrived on the stage. Afterwards Prakash Ambedkar, Samant and Joshi spoke. Apart from the unpleasant incident at the beginning, the meeting went quite well. Later on Joshi said, ‘One advantage of having Chhagan Bhujbal was getting the snorkel ladder free! We needed that ladder to garland the statute of Shivaji Maharaj on the ground and Bombay Municipal Corporation was the only body to have that kind of ladder. It used to charge a rent of Rs. 30,000 per day for it. Because of Bhujbal we got it free! The entire expense of organizing that rally was born by SS but it came to only Rs. 30,000! Samant was shocked to hear this because he was used to paying much larger amount for organizing his meetings!’ Anil Gote of SS had played a key role in organizing that massive rally and Samant was greatly impressed with him. Gote was a dynamic leader and later became an MLA from Dhule. Next year, Shankarrao Chavan, then Chief Minister of Maharashtra, reduced the cotton purchase price from Rs. 614 to Rs. 540 per quintal. Farmers were seething with anger. To consider further action a gathering was organized at Akola on 2 October 1986. Nearly one and a half lakh cotton growers attended. Also present were the representatives of farmers from Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Andhra and Haryana. Four main When White Gold Turned Red
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