BJP’s betrayal of farmers

The one year of Modi-led BJP government has heightened agrarian distress. Growth rate of agriculture has drastically fallen from 3.7 per cent in 2014 to merely 1.1 per cent in this period. Farmer suicides touched new heights. Every promise made to the farmers has been broken

The BJP manifesto had promised that its government would usher in ‘Achhe Din’ for farmers and put an end to farm suicides. They also claimed that the government would increase public investment in agriculture and rural development, take steps to enhance the profitability in agriculture by ensuring a minimum of 50 per cent profits over the cost of the production, cheaper agricultural inputs and credit, introduce latest technologies for farming and high-yielding seeds and link the MGNREGA to agriculture, implement a farm insurance scheme to take care of crop loss due to unforeseen natural calamities, institute a price stabilisation fund to protect farmers from volatile world market prices and more.

The manifesto also promised that “The BJP will adopt a ‘National Land Use Policy’, which will look at the scientific acquisition of non-cultivable land and its development, protect the interest of farmers and keep in mind the food production goals and economic goals of the country.” Welfare measures for farmers above 60 years, small and marginal farmers and farm labour were also promised. The BJP’s manifesto and Narendra Modi’s speeches during the campaign were literally an enlisting of the wish list of the farmers of India. What more could a farmer ask for?

However, the one year of Modi-led BJP government has heightened agrarian distress. Growth rate of agriculture has drastically fallen from 3.7 per cent in 2014 to merely 1.1 per cent in this period. Farmer suicides touched new heights. In December, 2014 merely six months into the Modi led BJP government, the mid-term assessment showed a 26 per cent increase in farm suicides. The BJP-ruled Maharashtra has seen a 40 per cent increase in farmers’ suicides.

The figure rose to a steep 1,373 between August 2014 and February 2015. There has been a further spurt in Farmers’ suicides after March 2015 due to the colossal damage to crops in more than 2 crore hectares across the country and insensitive handling of the crisis by the government. States like Haryana, Punjab, Gujarat, West Bengal, Telangana, Andhra Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh have also been witnessing suicides in an unprecedented scale. Haryana BJP Minister for Agriculture made extremely insensitive comments and described the farmers committing suicide as “cowards” and “criminals.” The BJP Ministers in Maharashtra also made such insensitive comments. The Union Agriculture Minister claimed in Parliament that not a single farmer had committed suicide in Haryana.

The government is continuing in this criminal denial mode and refusing to accept the truth or do anything about it. Modi’s main thrust in his campaign speeches was that steps would be taken to enhance the profitability in agriculture by ensuring a minimum of 50 percent profits over the cost of the production. The BJP government’s greatest betrayal was on this count. It made a meagre increase of Rs 50 a quintal for wheat and paddy and made zero increase in the MSP of most crops. The government told the Supreme Court on February 20, 2015, that it was not feasible to give minimum of 50% profits over cost of production. Input costs are skyrocketing and the BJP government has done nothing to control prices. Crop prices and Minimum Support Prices are unremunerative and do not even cover the costs of production, procurement mechanism is being fast dismantled and private players allowed to exploit distressed Farmers.

To add salt to injury, the government also issued an order directing States not to pay bonus for paddy and wheat over and above the MSP and stopping procurement by Food Corporation of India (FCI) from such States on the pretext that it was “market distorting.” The government also fast-paced steps to dismantle the FCI which procures foodgrains from farmers, and dilute the National Food Security Act 2013. It is doing exactly what the USA and EU as well as WTO have been demanding by scaling down the food security programme and the public stockholding programme. According to the latest Situation Assessment Survey of Agricultural Households in India by the NSSO in its 70th round (January – December, 2013) more than 60 per cent of the rural households in India are indebted with 92.9 per cent of households in Andhra Pradesh being indebted. Nothing has been done by the BJP government to provide debt relief, to make credit accessible to the farmers or ensure cheaper credit.

The allocation for agriculture and allied activities which was Rs 11,531 crores in the 2014-15 Budget Estimates has only seen a meagre increase to Rs 11,657 crore in the 2015-16 Budget. MGNREGA has been scaled down drastically and is being starved of funds. The BJP Government has sought that it be restricted to only 2,500 Blocks instead of the present 6,576 Blocks. When we consider the fact that there are over 600 Districts in the country the allocation of Rs.5600 crores for irrigation and organic farming will boil down to around Rs 9 crores per district for both schemes put together. It is anybody’s guess as to what irrigational infrastructure can be built or organic agriculture be encouraged out of such meagre funds.

The promise of comprehensive farm insurance scheme to take care of crop loss due to unforeseen natural calamities crop has been forgotten. In the wake of the crop loss in the unseasonal rains and hailstorm, the BJP government cut down by nearly 50 per cent the actual area where crops had been destroyed totally eliminating millions of farmers from claiming any compensation. It then announced a compensation of around 12,000 an acre and claimed that it was the highest ever. Even then, a farmer would remain in a state of extreme indebtedness. The BJP government has totally reversed its earlier stance on the Land Acquisition Act. It made a U-turn and brought amendments through the Ordinance route in December 2014. It will facilitate smooth takeover of land for corporate profiteering and real-estate speculation.

The government in effect reinstated the most draconian provisions of the Colonial Land Acquisition Act of 1894 and removed the necessity to seek consent of the farmers and other dependants on land as well as done away with the Social Impact Assessment altogether. The class of projects under the New Section 10 A will continue to be exempted from these requirements. It includes five items in the Special Category including industrial corridors and infrastructure projects under public private partnership. Since most acquisitions fall in these two categories, this has the impact of completely nullifying the minimal safeguards contained under the original LARR, 2013. The possibilities of some rehabilitation and resettlement benefits to dependants on land other than owners of the land have been totally discarded. There is no proposal for a Land Use Policy at national as well as state Level. Clearly each one of the promises made to the farmers has been broken. (INN)

By Vijoo Krishnan