Farm Agitation:  Loosing it's way or Gathering more Support

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Farm Agitation:  Loosing it's way or Gathering more Support

May 26 marks six months of the farm agitation. To mark the occasion, thousands of farmers from Punjab, Uttar Pradesh, Haryana, and several other states, Wednesday observed a “black day”, in Delhi. “We are not going anywhere,” they said and insisted that they have no plans to go home unless the government listened to them, repealed the three laws and offered them legal guarantee for minimum support price for their produce. They also want protection from the impact of the proposed Electricity Bill.

The three farm laws: Farmers’ Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Bill, 2020, The Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement of Price Assurance and Farm Services Bill, 2020, and The Essential Commodities (Amendment) Bill, 2020.

The government, from Prime Minister Narendra Modi to agriculture minister Narendra Tomar to defence minister Rajnath Singh all  have tried to mediate with the farmers, declaring their intention to alleviate the fears of the farming community. Protesting farmers however, have remained on the streets for the last six months despite 11 rounds of talks.

The farmers have been apprehensive of the intentions of the government when it legally and effectively opens up the Indian farm sector and leaves it for the market forces to control. The Opposition parties have also lent their support to the farmers’ demands.

Keeping the window of talks open, the government on its part,  remains firm. Rejecting the demand of the ‘Samyukta Kisan Morcha’ (SKM) - the umbrella body of farmers’ unions - for the repeal of farm laws and a legal guarantee of minimum support prices (MSP),  Agriculture Minister Narendra Singh Tomar said that the unions should either accept the government’s offer to suspend the farm laws for 18 months or come up with an alternative proposal for talks to resume.

Pandemic risk: In a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, SKM admits to “being deeply conscious of the risks of the pandemic”. By SKM’s  own admission, some 470 farmers have lost their lives in the first wave — it is not clear how many of those deaths were due to Covid. Any swelling of the ranks of the protesters now carries the risk of aggravating the health crisis, especially with the virus mutating into a more infectious variant. The agitating farmers risk harming not just themselves but carrying the contagion back to their villages and risking the lives of their family members, friends, neighbours and co-workers. Leaders of Opposition parties  may have legitimate political reasons to add their voice to the SKM agitation, but in this moment, they must also recognise the serious health challenge.

 

Has the grassroots struggle can lose its way?

The movement, writes the Hindustan Times  “is a classic example of how a grassroots struggle can lose its way because of rigidity and the absence of sound political leadership. It succeeded in bringing issues of India’s political economy, especially the transition in agriculture, to the forefront; it raised genuine questions about the process through which farm laws were pushed through in Parliament; it represented a moment of mass assertion in politics and pushed the government onto the defensive; and it drew international solidarity.

“But farm leaders failed to capitalise on their own political success. On January 26, elements within the movement turned violent, tarring India’s Republic Day celebrations. The unions refused to acknowledge that the government was willing to introduce a set of amendments to address their concerns, not wholly but substantially. They did not take up the government’s reasonable offer of the suspension of laws — an 18-month suspension effectively means the laws are unlikely to come into force during the term of the current Lok Sabha. They imposed impossible demands such as a legal guarantee for MSP, which will have inflationary consequences. And most fatally, they have continued mass protests even as the second wave has devastated lives in Delhi, Punjab, Haryana and west UP — and these political congregations would have played a role in spreading the infection, putting at risk the lives of farmers, their families, community, and society at large…….”

 

Farmer’s getting more support!

Sanjay Kumar (professor at CSDS, and a political analyst) presents a differing view arguing that the farmer movement is gathering support.  Data from recent post-poll surveys conducted by the Lokniti-CSDS team show significant support for the protesting farmers across states that held elections recently. Disquiet about the new farm laws, he writes  “extends to the BJP’s supporters.”

Support from middle class: The appeal of the farmers’ protests is not limited just to the poor, he says. “A sizeable section of the middle class is opposed to the farm laws. This class has been throwing its weight behind the BJP in recent elections, and more importantly has an outsized influence over public policies because they are able to amplify their voices through both traditional and new media channels. On many issues, their voice ends up shaping the dominant national discourse, and the farm laws could be yet another such issue.”

BJP supporters oppose laws: The post-poll survey data, writes Kumar,  shows that supporters of opposition parties are much more likely to oppose the farm laws compared to BJP’s supporters. For instance, 56% of Left voters in Kerala and 52% of the Congress-led alliance supporters in Assam oppose the farm laws. But a significant chunk of BJP voters also oppose the laws.

In Assam, the state where BJP retained power, 26% of those who voted for it believe that the new farm laws should be repealed. Among BJP voters in West Bengal, 22% support repeal of the new farm laws. Though BJP is not a dominant party in Kerala and Tamil Nadu, and contested elections in alliance with other parties, the support base that does exist does not seem to want the new farm laws to be enacted.

 

Government’s desire for reforms in the agriculture sector remains intact

At a time when the BJP faces multiple crises, it may well decide to have one less. This is not take away from the government’s desire for reforms in the agriculture sector.  In 2015, the central government unveiled an ambitious reform to overhaul India’s land acquisition laws that would have enabled corporations easier access to land across the country. But faced with intense protests from Opposition parties, the changes were rolled back.

In 2020, the second Modi-led government unveiled equally ambitious reforms in India’s farm laws that would have made it easier for companies to buy directly from farmers, bypassing traditional middlemen and ‘mandis’ (government wholesale farmer markets). Despite protests from Opposition parties, a challenge in the Supreme Court, and months-long farmer protests at the borders of Delhi, the centre has so far stood its ground, offering concessions, but not repeal.


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