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New Delhi : Union Minister Dr Jitendra Singh on SEptember 30, 2020, said that during the last 6 years of Modi Government, a number of historic steps were taken for welfare of farmers and there was a steady hike in MSP for helping in doubling their income.
Interacting with Sarpanches, BDC Chairmen, Farmers Organisations, and local activists of the peripheral hill districts of Doda, Reasi, Ramban, and Kishtwar, on the new Farm Laws enacted by the Centre, Dr Singh reiterated that the minimum support price (MSP) and APMC (Agricultural Produce & Livestock Market Committee) will continue and will never be removed at any cost. He said that some vested interests were spreading myths about their abolition, which need to be countered at all levels, according to a PIB release.
Dr Singh said the Committees will purchase Kharif and Rabi crops as usual, but the only difference is that a farmer can sell his produces also outside their areas now and even to private traders. He can do so anywhere, within the state and outside and the state governments cannot levy any fee on farmers for that. He also added that a farmer can now sign agreements with agri-business companies and keep stocks beyond present limits, which is truly a historic measure.
He said the arrival of Kharif Marketing Season 2020-21 has just begun and the Government continues to procure Kharif 2020-21 crops at MSP from farmers as per its existing MSP Schemes as done in previous seasons. He said, only two days back, National Cooperative Development Corporation (NCDC), the apex financing organisation of Union Agriculture Ministry, has sanctioned as first instalment funds amounting to Rs 19,444 crore to the states of Chhattisgarh, Haryana and Telangana for Kharif paddy procurement under Minimum Support Price (MSP) operations.
Hailing the move to eliminate middlemen in the new Farm Laws, Dr Singh said that it was this class which were eating the income of the farmers and coming in the way of their progress. He said, after 70 years of Independence, the farmers were liberated from the shackles of middlemen and now they can choose where to sell and whom to sell and thus will become producers and traders for the first time. He said, the Contract Agreement, as per the Act brought in through the new Agricultural Laws, will be for the crops and not for the land, and alleged that the farmers are being misled to believe otherwise.