BJP confident farm crisis won’t dent prospects

MUMBAI: In its five-year rule, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government in Maharashtra faced three droughts that wreaked havoc on farm produce, brought thousands of farmers on the streets and depressed incomes. Over the past three years, agricultural growth in the state was negative or negligible, and the government spent roughly ~7,000 crore since November 2018 to provide relief after a prolonged period of drought that hit about 28,000 or 64% of the state’s villages.

A combination of these circumstances in a state where more than 50% of the population lives in rural areas and about 60% are directly or indirectly dependent on agriculture would ordinarily hurt the incumbent party’s prospects in assembly elections.

But the agricultural downturn may not have a big impact on the poll prospects of the Devendra Fadnavis-led government in the October 21 elections, experts say.

There are two main reasons for this.

One, that the state government has ensured that a large amount of money — about ~30,000 crore in the past three years — was credited directly in the accounts of farmers through state and centrally funded schemes.

Two, a divided Opposition that is still reeling from its drubbing in the May general elections has been unable to galvanise farmers and instil confidence among the agricultural community that a strong alternative exists. In the face of the BJP’S strong nationalism pitch that is shriller in rural areas, the Opposition has failed to find a unifying message.

“The government has failed to understand fundamental need of agriculture sector to increase the growth,” said farm expert Vijay Jawandhia.

In its 2014 state election manifesto, the BJP had promised to reach double digit agricultural growth. In reality, the agricultural sector contracted by 8.3% in 2017-18 and grew by 0.4% in 2018-19.

The floods and delayed rainfall this year are unlikely to help the crop. The sugarcane crop in at least 150,000 hectares was damaged in the floods in Sangli, Kolhapur and Pune districts. Experts estimate this damage may result in a 25% drop in sugarcane production this year.

For two consecutive years, thousands of farmers marched from Nashik to Mumbai for demands ranging from a complete loan waiver to land deeds under the forest rights act, catapulting agricultural distress to the headlines. Though BJP government could not extend the blanket waiver, it did expanded scope of the loan waiver. The process of handing over land rights to tribal farmers has been expedited.

“The payout against the crop insurance is very less against the crop loss. The government officials harass us like anything. But this government has at least brought most of the schemes online bringing great amount of transparency,” said Raghunath Golde, farmer from Ravegaon in Jalna district.

Many other farmers say the payout from the annual crop insurance has not been sufficient, a demand taken up by BJP ally Shiv Sena.

“The direct benefit transfer could be a measure of poverty alleviation and does not attempt the fundamental issues related to the agriculture. Though the government has put money directly into the accounts of farmers under various state and central schemes, the farmers are sustaining losses due to government’s policies on import-export and minimum support prices,” said Ajit Nawale, a leader from the Communist Party of India who was one of the organizers of the farmers’ march to Mumbai two years ago.