Explained Ideas: Why Punjab’s farmers oppose the new farm laws

In his opinion piece in The Indian Express, Ajay Vir Jakhar, chairman, Bharat Krishak Samaj, explains the reasons.

The three farm acts were preceded by a high-level committee in 2015, headed by Shanta Kumar, which suggested measures to reorient the Food Corporation of India (FCI)’s operations by shifting away from the public distribution system to cash transfers.

This negates the very requirement of MSP procurement.

The Commission for Agricultural Costs and Prices has been recommending reviewing the open-ended procurement of foodgrain, which is also reflected in the recent RBI annual report that says that the MSP is no solution to farmer’s woes.

“Similar views were expressed by a Union cabinet minister lately. Therefore, the farmers infer that a path that makes MSP procurement redundant is inevitable and fear it will become applicable after the 2022 assembly elections,” writes Jakhar.

According to his calculations, without assured procurement in Punjab, the losses to the state could exceed Rs 15,000 crore.

“After reneging on the promise of fixing the MSP by the C2+50 per cent formula, the government settled on the (A2+FL)+50 per cent formula where the derived MSP is far less. There are rumours that to stave off a financial crisis, MSP in the future will be calculated separately for each state depending on their cost of cultivation. If true, in Punjab, the MSP for wheat and paddy will reduce to Rs 1,035 and Rs 1,094 per quintal respectively — the loss could be more than Rs 26,000 crore,” he writes.

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He states that an opportunity has been lost in the lackadaisical handling of the issue and ends his piece with a warning.

“I doubt if future historians will recall when Punjab changed course, and how an issue of farmer livelihood morphed into one of Punjab’s survival.”