What if farMers stop groWing Wheat and rice?
“All governments have treated farmers as second class citizens despite the fact that they feed the nation,” charge Chaudhary Pushpendra Singh, who is among the new crop of leaders emerging from the farmers’ agitation for waiving of farm loans. Though several states have waived off loans of small and marginal farmers, the sons of the soil are not fully happy. Suicides by debt-ridden farmers are continuing. “Just think of a worst scenario; if upset farmers go on strike, even for one year, and stop growing grain and rice (except for their own consumption), what will happen?” asks Pushpendra while talking to The Sunday Guardian and answers himself that “people in the urban jungles will be crying and dying. Then only they will realise how much farmers sweat to feed their stomach”.
“Shouldn’t the economists worry more about the 60% agriculture dependent population of this country, who earn a meagre Rs 3,081 on an average every month from agriculture per farm household?” asks Puspendra, pointing out that in contrast the Seventh Pay Commission has recommended a minimum basic pay of Rs 18,000 per month for the lowest paid government employee. According to the Economic Survey 2016-17, an average farm household income is a paltry Rs 1,666 per month in 17 most backward states. Coming from a cultivator’s family in village Bilsuri, district Bulandshahr, western Uttar Pradesh, Pushpendra is apolitical. A product of the Institute of Rural Management Anand (IRMA) in Gujarat, Pushpendra is in great demand these days in television channels’ debates on farmers’ issues. He had earlier worked with a fertilizer firm. As the president of his organisation, Kisan Shakti Sangh, he has become the most vocal advocate of cultivators. On UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath’s recent announcement of a Rs 36,359 crore farm loan waiver to fulfil a poll promise, Pushpendra says that “it is only one step on the long road, but such loan waivers are not helping all the farmers, as a majority of them borrow money on high interest from local moneylenders.” He demands that the government should implement the Swaminathan Commission report that has recommended land reforms, credit, and insurance and that the minimum support price for the crops should be, at least, 50% more than the weighted average cost of production. Flashing a yellow chart, Pushpendra argues that the banks’ non-performing assets are valued at around Rs 9 lakh crore, which are regularly written off; the income tax outstanding demand is also around Rs 9 lakh crore, which is admittedly difficult to recover; the government gives various tax incentives to various industries in an annual budget amounting to around Rs 9 lakh crore. “The farm loan is also around Rs 8.77 lakh crore as per NABARD’s 2015-16 report. When huge waivers, write-offs and incentives could be given to the corporate world, why can’t the government waive off farmers’ loans as they are reeling under great distress, forcing many of them to commit suicides?”