The President of National Cooperative Union of India Dr Chandra Pal Singh Yadav made a strong pitch for farmers in his maiden speech in Parliament. Speaking for more than 15 minutes Shri Yadav touched upon practically all issues related to farming and farmers.
My Yadav said with a lament that a MNREGA labour is better off than a farmer who has 2 acres of land. A five member family earns Rs 1000 at the rate of Rs 200 each under the MNREGA scheme while a farmer having a family of five persons cannot make even Rs 200 daily from his 2 acre land.
”After the 70s’ the agricultural produce has increased no doubt but the conditions of farmers have worsened forcing them to migrate to urban centres. I come from Bundelkhand and I know that farmers with even larger land-holdings and who cannot work as farm labour in their own villages due to reasons of social prestige come to Mumbai and Delhi to pull rickshaws. Such is the state of affairs in rural India, Yadav said in pin-drop silence.
Referring to the Swaminathan Report Shri Chandra Pal Singh said government announces minimum support price but does not ensure farmers get it. And the MSP itself is hopelessly inadequate in the wake of hike in the prices of all agricultural inputs such as diesel, urea and seed, Mr Yadav added.
Chandra Pal batted for a processing unit at the village level itself for the farm produce so the benefits accrue to farmers directly. He also argued for a detailed study of water table of each village so that a comprehensive irrigation scheme could be started. The judicious mix of surface-water and underground water is key to the issue of irrigation, he said.
He quoted the case of UP govt and congratulated Akhilesh Singh the Chief Minister for waiving off loans on the farmers who are not able to repay or whose land has been auctioned. Today a farmer is running from pillar to post to secure fertilizers due to the wrong policies of the government. He blamed decontrol of phosphetic fertilizer and subsidy on nitrate based fertilizer for the international prices of fertilizers spiralling up.
Easy loan, soil testing at village level, availability of seed were some other issues he touched upon during his speech. But most of all he batted for social security of farmers and demanded a pension scheme for farmers after the age of 60.” Feel the pain, their wealth is dwindling, their social clout is diminishing and their pocket is depleting. The UPA govt did nothing and the NDA govt has also been a dismal failure despite tall promises,” he thundered.
