Even now, Modi is making fun of farmers, says Rahul

Congress President Rahul Gandhi on Wednesday jumped over an admission by the agriculture ministry to the parliamentary standing committee on finance that demonetisation two years ago hit millions of farmers as they were unable to buy seeds and fertilisers for their winter crops.

“Look, PM Modi’s own ministry says that the ‘note-bandi’ broke backbone of the farmers, destroying life of crores of farmers as they didn’t have enough money to buy seeds, fertilisers,” Rahul tweeted. He regretted that even now Modi is making fun of the farmers’ misfortune.

The ministry’s acknowledgement of the impact of demolition came on Tuesday when Prime Minister, speaking at a rally in Jhabua in Madhya Pradesh, asserted that he used the ‘bitter medicine’ of demonetisation to bring back money into the banking system and to give “proper treatment to deeprooted corruption system” in the country.

“Yes, farmers had to deposit all their money into the banking system and banks did not allow them to withdraw their own money to carry on the agricultural operations,” the Congress said.

The farmers’ distress is an important issue in three of five states facing the Assembly elections. The ministry’s report may not affect Chhattisgarh as the elections were over there on Tuesday but it will certainly impact the upcoming elections in Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan. Congress general secretary Ashok Gehlot also tweeted that the Congress has been saying that farmers badly affected by note-ban and demanding govt provide relief to farmers in terms of loan waiver and proper MSP for their crops. "At least now Modi ji should begin course correction," he said. The standing committee headed by Congress MP Veerappa Moily, was on Tuesday briefed on the impact of demonetisation by the Ministries of Agriculture, Labour and Employment, and Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises. While the labour ministry filed a laudatory report on demonetisation claiming total employment in establishments with ten or more workers increased as seen from the quarterly employment surveys (QES), the agriculture ministry pointed out how the farmers were doomed as they did not have enough cash to carry on operations.

The agriculture ministry report submitted to the standing committee says the demonetisation came at a time when farmers were engaged in either selling their Kharif crops or sowing the Rabi crops. Both these operations needed huge amounts of cash, which demonetisation removed from the market.