UPDATE
India farmers protests: Thousands swarm Delhi against deregulation rules
By Julia Hollingsworth, Swati Gupta and Esha Mitra CNN

Tens of thousands of farmers have swarmed India's capital where they intend to camp out for weeks to protest new agricultural laws that they say could destroy their livelihoods.

© Biplov Bhuyan/Hindustan Times/Shutterstock 

Farmers congregate during day five of the protest against the new farm reform laws at Singhu border on November 30, 2020 in New Delhi, India.

Farmers from the nearby states of Punjab, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh began arriving by tractors and on foot at the outskirts of New Delhi last week, where they blocked roads and set up makeshift camps, according to protest leaders. Some slept on the road or in their tractors, and several places of worship offered protesters food.

Police attempted to block demonstrators from entering the city. They fired tear gas and water cannons Thursday and Friday after protesters pelted police officers with stones and damaged public property, according to Manoj Yadav, a senior police official from Haryana.

The farmers are protesting laws passed in September, which Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi says will give farmers more autonomy to set their own prices and sell directly to private businesses, such as supermarket chains.

But the move has infuriated India's farmers, who say that the new rules will leave them worse off by making it easier for corporates to exploit agricultural workers who make up more than half of India's 480 million-strong workforce, according to India's most recent Census in 2011.

According to Ashutosh Mishra, the media coordinator of protest organizer All India Kisan Sangharsh Committee, which represents around 200 farming unions, tens of thousands of demonstrators have gathered at each of New Delhi's three borders -- a line of protesters at one of the borders stretches for 30 kilometers (19 miles), he said.

Police have put up barriers and dug up roads to prevent protesters from coming into the city center to hold sit-ins. Mishra expects more farmers from around the country to join the protests in the coming days.

That's despite New Delhi being a hotspot for Covid-19 in a country that has already reported more than 9.4 million reported cases, the most in any country bar the United States.

"We are trying to be weary of Covid but we don't have an option -- it is a question of life and death," said Mukut Singh, the president of a farmers union in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh, who is leading thousands in protest in his home state, and says he will join the protesters in Delhi later this week.

"We are the ones who have provided food, milk, vegetables when the whole country was in lockdown -- we were still toiling in the fields," he said. "It is the government who has put us at risk by introducing these laws during Covid."

What the protests are about

For decades, the Indian government has offered guaranteed prices to farmers for certain crops, providing long-term certainty that allows them to make investments for the next crop cycle

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© Mayank Makhija/NurPhoto/Getty Images 

Security personnel deployed to stop farmers from entering the national capital during a protest against the Centre's new farm laws at Singhu border near Delhi, India on November 30, 2020.

Under the previous laws, farmers had to sell their goods at auction at their state's Agricultural Produce Market Committee, where they were guaranteed to get at least the government-agreed minimum price. There were restrictions on who could purchase at auction and prices were capped for essential commodities.

Modi's new laws dismantle the committee structure, allowing farmers to sell their goods to anyone for any price. Farmers have more freedom to do things such as sell direct to buyers and sell to other states.

Modi said increasing market competition would be a good thing as it fulfills farmers' demands for higher income and gives them new rights and opportunities.

© Biplov Bhuyan/Hindustan Times/Shutterstock

 Farmers prepare food during day five of protests over farm reform laws at Singhu border on November 30, 2020 in New Delhi, India.

"The farmers should get the advantage of a big and comprehensive market which opens our country to global markets," Modi said on Monday, as farmers protested in the capital. He hopes it will attract private investment into the agricultural industry, which has lagged as other parts of the country's economy have modernized.

But farmers argue that the rules could help big companies drive down prices. While farmers could sell crops at elevated prices if the demand is there, conversely, they could struggle to meet the minimum price in years when there is too much supply in the market.

Singh, the Uttar Pradesh farmer, said that removing the price guarantees will make life tougher for farmers.

"There is a lot of anger among farmers," he said. "We don't get even the minimum support price that is presently declared -- removing these protections and making it easier for corporates to enter will completely buy us out."


Why it's such a hot political issue

Agriculture is the primary source of livelihood for about 58% of India's 1.3 billion population, meaning farmers are the biggest voter block in the country.

That's made farming a central political issue, with farmers arguing for years to get the minimum guaranteed prices increased.

In a bid to win over farmers, Modi's Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) said in its 2014 general election manifesto that all crop prices should be fixed at a minimum of 50% higher than the production costs. In 2016, Modi promised to boost the country's agriculture sector with a target of doubling the income of farmers by 2022.

Modi and his government continue to insist that they are supporting farmers.

He hailed the new laws as a "watershed moment" which will ensure a complete transformation of the agriculture sector. But besides calling the move long overdue, Modi has not said why he opted to introduce these measures during the pandemic, which has caused India to suffer its first recession in decades.

"The Indian government under the leadership of Prime Minister Modi has always stood in full commitment to resolving the problems faced by farmers and will continue to stand by them," said Narendra Singh Tomar, the Minister of Agriculture and Farmer Welfare.

Tomar urged farmers to abandon their protests and instead discuss their issues with the government -- although so far, Modi has shown no sign of capitulating to protesters' demands.

© Manish Rajput/SOPA Images/Shutterstock 

Farmers gather near a police road block stopping them from marching to New Delhi during a demonstration on November 30, 2020.

NFU stands in solidarity with Indian farmers protesting new agricultural laws

DECEMBER 6, 2020
FOOD SOVEREIGNTY INTERNATIONAL SOLIDARITY

The National Farmers Union stands in solidarity with farmers in India, who continue to protest new agricultural laws formally passed in September. This agriculture reform will effectively undermine the guaranteed prices farmers receive through government purchase of staple crops and open them up to exploitation by large corporations. Tens of thousands of Indian farmers are protesting, demanding that these reforms be rescinded or that a new law be introduced to guarantee them a minimum price for their crops. “We in Canada recognize the Indian farmers’ struggle as similar to our own struggle. We support them in their right to protest, and in their call for agriculture policy that supports the millions of smallholder farmers growing food in India,” said NFU President Katie Ward.


As shrinking net farm incomes reach a crisis level for farmers around the world and also in Canada, Canadian farmers understand the need for government regulation that works for farmers rather than for those who take profits at the expense of farmers. “We have experienced the dismantling of institutions that were vital to the bargaining power and, by extension, incomes of Canadian farmers,” said NFU Vice-President Stewart Wells, “For example the loss of the single desk marketing system for hogs in the 1990’s and more recently the destruction of the Canadian Wheat Board, among others.”

As a result of losing the single-desk marketing system for hogs, thousands of Canadian farmers could no longer raise hogs because they could not access the market without a contract. The intentional shift to corporate hog production has left that sector fully vertically integrated and dominated by only three meat processing corporations. Prices are regularly below the cost of the production. The industry is heavily dependent on government safety nets to ride out the highly volatile market. It is an industry now largely devoid of family farmers. The change in hog farming in Canada was swift and brutal for family farmers raising hogs – a direct result of agriculture policy aimed at assisting corporations instead of farmers.


While the circumstances of Indian farmers are vastly different than Canadian farmers in many ways, it is clear that agricultural policies that serve to undercut farmers’ livelihoods to make room for large corporations to profit will have devastating consequences for the millions of smallholder farmers and their families.

India’s food security is threatened, as the new laws will shift its agricultural economy from “food production” for people to “commodity production” for trade and export. Farmers take on more debt and risk in a system of contract farming. The new laws will lift the ban on hoarding food by corporate buyers, which will allow them to capitalize on ups and downs in production by price-gouging consumers during shortages and depressing prices to farmers in times of abundance.


“Farmers did not ask for this reform, and it is not in their interest. The impacts will be devastating and far-reaching. Canada’s NFU supports Indian farmers in their opposition to these reforms,” Ward stated, “We object to the suppression of democratic protest taking place in India this week. We stand with Indian farmers, and their right to protect their livelihoods by protesting the imposition of these unjust laws.”

-30-

Backgrounder to NFU statement in solidarity with Indian farmers

DECEMBER 8, 2020
INTERNATIONAL SOLIDARITY

Why are India’s farmers protesting?

India has 164 million farmers, and many have small farms where they grow food to feed themselves and sell locally to feed their communities. Over half of India’s workforce is involved in the agriculture sector. Hundreds of thousands of farmers are protesting impending changes that will result from three controversial laws. Farm leaders have been in talks with government, demanding that these laws be repealed. Tens of thousands of farmers are in New Delhi itself, and more camped out around the city, blocking entrances. Protests are occurring all across India, with the support of non-farmers in other sectors such as transport. On December 8, the farmers called for a peaceful national general strike in support of their demands.

New laws passed in September set to go into effect in December

In June 2020 the Indian Cabinet put forward three controversial agriculture reform bills in conjunction with its suite of COVID 19 measures. In September, these bills – The Farmers (Empowerment & Protection) Agreement of Price Assurance and Farm Services Bill, The Essential Commodities Act (Amendment) Bill and Farmers’ Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Bill – were passed by the Indian Parliament in a rushed process, without allowing for extended debate or careful examination by a committee. The final vote was conducted by voice rather than ballot, making it impossible to have a clear count of the votes. The bills will become law once they are approved by President Ram Nath Kovind, which is expected to happen in December.
The Bills

The Farmers (Empowerment & Protection) Agreement of Price Assurance and Farm Services Bill – This bill allows for direct contracting between farmers and buyers prior to sowing, but does not require these contracts to be in writing, does not penalize companies that fail to register their contracts, and does not set a minimum price. The farmers can thus be left with no recourse if terms of the contracts are not fulfilled.

The Essential Commodities Act (Amendment) Bill – This bill removes all limits that have, until now, prevented companies from hoarding basic food items including cereals, pulses, oilseeds, edible oils, onions, and potatoes, even in the event of war, famine or natural disaster. This change was made at the request of food processing and food exporting corporations.

Farmers’ Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Bill – This bill deregulates trade by allowing farmers to sell outside of their own state’s Agricultural Produce and Livestock Market Committee (APMC) markets, and prevents states from collecting fees from the markets to fund their operation. This will allow corporations to set up their own, unregulated markets.

Implications for farmers

Direct contracting increases the power of buyers. To reduce costs of obtaining supplies, companies will purchase from the largest farms and/or look for the lowest prices. This will lead to small farms no longer having access to any market. As small farmers are forced out, land holdings will become larger and more concentrated. Vertical integration of farms with processing companies will accelerate this process, as risks and debts are offloaded onto the least powerful in the value chain.

As small farmers lose their land or are no longer able to survive on lower, deregulated prices they will be forced to leave villages and move to cities, where employment is uncertain. Small farmers produce food for themselves and communities. By shifting from public markets to corporate buyers who operate nationally, food will move towards to larger markets. There will be less food available locally and it will be more expensive.

Allowing corporations to hoard food empowers them to buy up supplies at low prices when there is a good harvest. It shifts the public “strategic reserve” meant to buffer volatility and prevent hardship and instead creates private control of the food supply. Companies will be allowed to export hoarded food, even in the event of natural disaster, war or famine in India.
The new laws create a positive environment for consolidation of farmland, concentration of ownership in agricultural companies, greater control of markets and prices by large processors, retailers and exporters, and increased sales of commercial seed, chemical inputs such as fertilizer, herbicides and pesticides, and digital technology for data mining, surveillance and automation.

Which powerful corporations stand to gain?

Some of the same multinational food, agribusiness and technology companies active in Canada are also active in India: including Bayer, BASF, Dow Dupont, Nestle, Coca Cola, Pespsi, Amazon, IBM and Microsoft. Some of the large agribusiness corporations are also Indian, such as Tata, Bharat Group, Atul, and Nuziveedu Seeds.

Why does this matter to Canadians?

If allowed to go into effect, these laws will increase the power of the world’s largest agribusiness corporations. It will embolden them to demand similar changes in other countries. The ability of large corporations to force down prices to Indian farmers and to demand adherence to corporate priorities as a condition of making a living will affect farmers around the world.

As Canadians and fellow farmers we recognize the harm that the Indian laws will do to Indian farmers and their families. We want to live in a world where human lives are respected, where people can democratically shape their future together, carry forward their food cultures intact, and have hope that our children will be able to live well as farmers if and when they choose to.

We are stronger when we act together, whether it is by marketing our products or standing up for our rights.

Tractor rally: India farmers lead massive protest on Republic Day


Mon., January 25, 2021

Farmers say they want the government to roll back controversial farm reforms

Tens of thousands of protesting farmers have begun driving into capital Delhi on tractors on India's Republic Day.

They have been striking for months at the city's borders, demanding a roll back of recent market-friendly reforms.

They have been allowed to go ahead with the tractor rally on the condition that it will not disturb the official celebrations on Tuesday.

The government has offered to put the reforms on hold, but farmers say they want a repeal.

The rally was expected to begin from six entry points to Delhi and police barricaded all of them - farm groups were told to enter the city only after the Republic Day parade was over.

But farm groups at two different borders - Singhu and Tikri - have reportedly broken through barricades and and have begun their march, on foot and in tractors.

They have not been allowed in central Delhi where official celebrations are taking place. The annual parade involves armed forces showcasing their latest equipment and floats from several states presenting their culture on a national stage. The parade is shorter and more muted this year due to the pandemic.

Tractors carrying groups of farmers travelled to the city in the past few days, in addition to thousands that were already blocking several entrance points for more than a month.

How Narendra Modi misread the mood of India's angry farmers

India farmers: The viral image that defines a protest

Tuesday's rally is the latest episode in a months-long protest, one of the longest farmers' protest India has ever seen.

The laws, which seek to further open up agriculture to the free market, sparked protests even as they made their way through parliament in September. While Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Bharatiya Janata Party-led government defended the reforms, farmer groups likened them to a 'death warrant' that made them vulnerable to corporate companies.

The stand-off continued as tens of thousands of farmers from the northern states of Punjab and Haryana marched to Delhi in late November and began sit-ins at the border, many of which still continue.
What exactly do the laws propose?

Taken together, the laws loosen rules around sale, pricing and storage of farm produce - rules that have protected India's farmers from the free market for decades.

One of the biggest changes is that farmers will be allowed to sell their produce at a market price directly to private players - agricultural businesses, supermarket chains and online grocers.

More than 90% of India's farmers already sell their produce in the market - and only about 6% of them actually receive assured prices for their crops, guaranteed by the government.

Many farmers sell produce at large wholesale markets or mandis

But farmers are mainly concerned that this will eventually lead to the end of government-controlled wholesale markets (mandis) and assured prices, leaving them with no back-up option. That is, if they are not satisfied with the price offered by a private buyer, they cannot return to the mandi or use it as a bargaining chip during negotiations.

Most of the protesting farmers are from Punjab and Haryana, where the two biggest crops, wheat and rice, are still sold at assured prices in mandis.
Are these reforms necessary?

Most economists and experts agree that Indian agriculture desperately needs reform. But critics of the government say it failed to follow a consultative process and did not take farmers' unions into confidence before passing the laws.

For one, the bills were put to a hurried a voice vote in parliament, leaving little time for debate, which infuriated the opposition. And state governments, which play a crucial role in enacting such legislation, also appear to have been left out of the loop.

Hundreds of women farmers have joined the protests

Experts also point out that the reforms fail to take into account that agriculture still remains a mainstay in the Indian economy.

More than half of Indians work on farms, but the sector accounts for barely a sixth of the country's GDP. Declining productivity and a lack of modernisation have shrunk incomes and hobbled agriculture in India for decades. The government, meanwhile, provides farmers with generous subsidies, exempts them from income tax and crop insurance, guarantees a minimum price for 23 crops and regularly waives off debts.

"Now the government is saying, we will get out of the way, and asking us to deal directly with big businesses. But we didn't demand this in the first place! So why are they doing this to us?" Rakesh Vyas, a farmer, told BBC's Soutik Biswas recently.

Experts say any attempt to dismantle decades-old concessions must happen through dialogue because fear and suspicion will only derail the process.

Thousands of people are protesting with farmers in India. This is why you should care

Ramanpreet Kaur demonstrated on December 5 in Queens, New York and estimates around 150 others joined her.

By Alisha Ebrahimji, CNN
 Fri December 11, 2020

(CNN)Farmers in India have reached a stalemate with the government over its proposed amendments to laws the farmers feel will ravage their livelihoods and create an opportunity for large, private companies to enter and exploit the entire agriculture sector.

The laws directly impact the farmers in India, but they could also have a significant impact to consumers globally, who rely on India for many key items such as turmeric, chili and ginger.
To fight against three laws passed in September, farmers from all across the country have been protesting for days just outside New Delhi -- despite the capital being a hotspot for Covid-19 in a country that has already reported more than 9.4 million cases.

More than half of India's working population comes from the agricultural sector, according to India's most recent Census in 2011. From 2018-2019, the average Indian farmer earned 10,329 rupees (about $140) per month, according to data from a Hindustan Times analysis. Of these 263.1 million workers, many solely rely on farming to put food on their own table and roof over their head.

Farmers from Punjab, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh arrived by tractors and on foot in New Delhi last month where they blocked roads and set up makeshift camps, according to protest leaders. Some slept on the road or in their tractors, and several places of worship offered protesters food.

Tens of thousands of farmers swarm India's capital to protest deregulation rules

VIDEO

Here's why tens of thousands of Indian farmers are protesting 01:51

It affects your pantry

The protests haven't been exclusive to India.

People around the world have been protesting to show support and stand with the farmers because the protests are about "the people who feed all of us" and their fair treatment, said Simran Jeet Singh, a scholar of religion and history currently teaching at Union Seminary and a Stephen M. Keller Term Member for the Council on Foreign Relations.

"The pandemic has shown us that there are two economies," he said. "Essential workers across the world are suffering. The farmers in India represent all of them, and their resistance to unjust legislation that privileges the uber-wealthy corporations is a resistance that speaks to so many of us all over the world."

India is the world's largest producer, consumer and exporter of spices -- producing about 68% of the world's spices, according to Spices Board India, Ministry of Commerce & Industry, Govt. of India.

In 2019, the top 10 importers of Indian spices were the US, China, Vietnam, Hong Kong, Bangladesh, Thailand, UK, UAE, Malaysia, and Sri Lanka, data shows.

Items like pepper, cardamom, chilli, ginger, turmeric, coriander, cumin, garlic, curry powder and fennel are among the exports.

India is the leading exporter of Basmati rice and world's largest milk producer to the global market, according to India's Agricultural & Processed Food Products Export Development Authority, with the main production happening in states like Punjab, Haryana, and Delhi -- where the farmers are also protesting.

The country is also the world's second-largest producer of rice, wheat and other cereals, ranking second in fruits and vegetable production in the world just under China.
Herbs and medicine go hand-in-hand for those practicing homeopathy or Ayurveda, an ancient Hindu system of medicine based on the idea of balance within your body, built on the foundation of herbal treatment, yoga and breathing.

At times, ginger is served for arthritis and digestion, cinnamon to boost circulation and lower blood sugar, and fenugreek to fight infection -- all top exports of the country.

India is home to thousands of plants but 7,500 of them are known and used for medicinal uses, according to data from the Journal of Ethnobiology and Ethnomedicine. The same data says approximately 25% of drugs are derived from plants.

It affects your closet
Chances are something in your closet was made in India -- and that's because India is the world's leading producer of cotton, surpassing China, according to the United States Department of Agriculture.

"Although yields in India are well below the global average, cotton area in India dwarfs that of any other country, accounting for approximately 40 percent of the world total," the department said.

What do the laws say?

For decades, the Indian government has offered guaranteed prices to farmers for certain crops, creating a stable guide to make decisions and investments for the following crop cycle.
Under the previous laws, farmers had to sell their goods at an auction at their state's Agricultural Produce Market Committee. A government-agreed minimum price was set for items and the auction was regulated by restrictions on who could buy along with price caps on essentials.

India's Prime Minister Narendra Modi says the new laws give farmers a chance to decide their own prices and sell directly to private businesses, like grocery chains, cutting the middle man, who in this case, is the state's Agricultural Produce Market Committee.

Farmers argue Modi's new laws help big companies drive down prices. While farmers could sell crops at higher prices if the demand is there, conversely, they could struggle to meet the minimum price in years when there is too much supply in the market.

"In the past, when Indian agricultural workers have protested for fair prices and working conditions, the Indian government has responded with violent crackdowns that include documented torture, human rights abuses, and extrajudicial killings," Simran Singh said.
"It is critical that, in this moment of peaceful protest, we keep our eyes trained on India's response, and ensure that they do not again resort to repressive tactics as a way to thwart free speech and protest."

Voices on the ground

Police attempted to block demonstrators from entering New Delhi when protests first began -- they fired tear gas and water cannons, after protesters pelted police officers with stones and damaged public property, according to Manoj Yadav, a senior police official from Haryana.
From France, Germany, California, New York, Texas, Canada, Netherlands and London -- people have shown up in solidarity over the last two weeks.

As a Sikh Punjabi woman, the fight for Ramanpreet Kaur in New York is about her "grandparents and parents who have lived through so many hardships and kept the farming culture alive in our families to provide for us."

"Even if you don't feel a personal connection to India or the farmers out there like many of us do, as a human being who lives on earth you should be concerned about exploitation of the people who feed you everyday," she said.

Manveer Singh said he feels the impact of India's new laws all the way in Vancouver, Canada, through his cousins in Punjab who still farm today.

"The entire world should care about this issue, because in a globalized society we are all connected," he said. "Everything from turmeric to Basmati comes from Indian farmers."

Manveer Singh joined a demonstartion on December 5 outside the Indian consulate in downtown Vancouver.

"And above personal interests, we need to value human beings over corporations. That in itself is the central ethos of what has become one of the biggest protests in human history."

Rajbir Singh, from Amsterdam, said farming has always been the only way his family has made money -- and for some of them, it still is.

Protests in front of the Den Haag in front of the Indian Embassy on Tuesday, December 8.

"For me to see that all Indian farmers now indirectly have to work for these big corporations is unacceptable," he said. "That's why I am protesting and urge the rest of the farming communities in the world to stand with the Indian farmers."

What happens now and how to help

On Wednesday, Indian farmers rejected the government's proposed amendments, according to an Indian farmers union.

Darshan Pal, President of the Krantikari Kisan Union, a farmer's union said protests will intensify and farmers plan to block the highway between New Delhi to Jaipur, the capital of western Rajasthan state, on December 12, which will lead up to a nationwide protest by December 14, with calls to gather outside the regional offices of India's ruling Bharatiya Janata Party.

Organizations like Khalsa Aid, an international humanitarian relief group, has a team on the ground working with protest organizers.

Sahaita, a volunteer-based humanitarian non-profit, is collecting monetary donations to help families affected.

And cultural clothing brands, like Reignfull and ZHK Designs, are donating profits from their merchandise and art to organizations focused on rendering aid.

CNN's Julia Hollingsworth, Swati Gupta, Esha Mitra and Manveena Suri contributed to this report.

Pepsi action against Gujarat potato farmers declared 'violation of public interest'

By Our Representative

Thursday, December 09, 2021

The Protection of Plant Varieties & Farmers' Rights (PPV&FR) Authority has accepted a farm activist’s Revocation Application, to revoke the varietal registration of Pepsico India Holding (PIH) on potato variety FL-2027.

Calling it a a precedent-setting judgement a joint note issued by several farmers' rights groups said, it means that anything that threatens farmers rights as contained in India's unique legislation is, and ought to be a matter of Public Interest. "This is a victory for farmers of India", it said.

PPV&FR in its virtual hearing accepted a plea for revocation of the PVP certificate granted to PepsiCo India Holding on the potato variety in India (FL-2027), on multiple grounds.

Grounds included are: that the grant of the certificate of registration has been based on incorrect information furnished by the applicant (Sec.34 (a)), that the certificate has been granted to a person not eligible for protection (Sec.34(b)), that the breeder did not provide the Registrar with such information, documents or material as required for registration (Sec.34 (c)), and that the grant of the certificate of registration is not in the public interest (Sec.34 (h)).

This means that Pepsico’s varietal intellectual property rights (IPR) as granted in a plant variety certificate in February 2016 will be taken back by the authority. The judgement brings to light the procedural gaps in the grant of PVCs. Importantly, farmers’ rights as contained in India’s Act and any attempt to harass and intimidate farmers have been considered as a matter of public interest, through this judgement.

The revocation application used specific clauses (Sec.34 (g)) in India's Protection of Plant Varieties and Farmers' Rights (PPV&FR) Act 2001 and argued that the IPR granted to Pepsico India on a potato variety was not as per provisions laid down for registration and was also against public interest. The revocation application was filed by farmer rights activist Kavitha Kuruganti, who said, the judgement is unprecedented in India's statutory history related to farmers' seed rights.

The revocation application was filed on June 11, 2019, and the authority took almost 30 months in arriving at this conclusion on Kuruganti's application. The company now has just about two months of the original registration time period left which was till January 31, 2022 (the registration certificate given to the company was renewable up to January 31, 2031, but now stands revoked).

The judgement sets a precedent for all seed and F&B corporations and other registrants to not only uphold, but also more importantly, not to transgress the legally granted farmers’ seed rights and freedoms in India, said Kuruganti.

“This judgement of the Authority is significant and historic. It upholds farmers’ seed freedoms as contained in Sec. 39 of the PPV&FR Act, which makes this sui generis law of India truly unique. The Authority’s acceptance of the Revocation Application, including on grounds of being against public interest, sends an important signal that farmers’ rights cannot be taken lightly by IPR-holders in the country", said Shalini Bhutani, legal researcher and IPR expert in agriculture and biodiversity.

"This should prevent further intimidation of farmers through vexatious IP lawsuits. The PPV&FR Act 2001 provides routine legal provisions for opposition to the IP registration at the time of grant of registration [Sec.21(3) read with Sec. 34]", Bhutani explained.

"The grounds for subsequent revocation include [Sec. 34(h)] that the grant of the certificate of registration is not in public interest; this is a fundamental safeguard for farmers’ inherent seed rights Sec.34 for Revocation of the IP protection has been reinforced by our law-makers in their wisdom keeping in mind that developments warranting intervention could happen after the grant of certificate of registration, requiring the said IP Registration to be revoked”, she added.

The civil society note said, in the current case, Pepsico India used the certificate that it got from the authority on FL-2027 potato variety to sue hapless and uninformed farmers in Gujarat in 2018 and 2019, basing its actions on a non-existent exclusive right that it claims to have obtained against Indian farmers also. The judgement of the authority also says this.

On the other hand, the Indian legislation is unambiguous that farmers have over-arching rights over what seed they can plant as well as what they are entitled to do with their produce from any variety, including seed of registered variety. The only condition is that they may not sell seed of protected varieties in a branded fashion, knowingly, the note continued.

Indian legislation is unambiguous: Farmers have over-arching rights over what seed they can plant and what they are entitled to do with their produce
Even here, an Indian farmer can claim innocent infringement if done unknowingly.

 Despite the law being this clear, Pepsico India harassed and intimidated farmers and sued them for exorbitant levels of alleged damages in 2018 and 2019. PIH also engaged detectives to entrap farmers and took secret video footage to build its cases, it added.
“It is a welcome development. With this judgement, the authority has chosen to uphold the legal rights granted to farmers and has decisively considered Pepsi’s actions against potato farmers in Gujarat as a violation of public interest. The Order today follows another responsible action that the Authority took several months ago, when it corrected the factual mistakes we pointed out in the FAQs document on their website", said Dr Suman Sahai of the Gene Campaign.

"We are happy with the result of this case filed with the Authority and feel proud to be instrumental in setting up the precedent that asserts farmers’ rights. We are thankful to the farm activists also", said Bipinbhai Patel, one of the farmers sued by PIH in 2019.

"We believe that the Authority and the Government have a responsibility to let every applicant and registrant under the PPV&FR Act know that their rights do not supersede farmers' rights. The registrants’ rights are limited to only production of a variety, and not production from a variety. Even when it comes to production of a variety, farmers have rights to produce seed and even sell seed of a protected variety provided it is unbranded", said Kapil Shah of the Kisan Beej Adhikar Manch.

"Companies should not think that they are at liberty to harass farmers -- we are watching, and will disallow any such mischief. For us, any intimidation and harassment of farmers is clearly a matter of public interest. We sincerely hope that the Authority will proactively put into place all measures and mechanisms possible to ensure that farmers' rights are not violated at any cost", asserted Kuruganti.

The interpretation of 'public interest' by the Authority today is very progressive. This is a victory for farmers in the country, especially of the potato farmers in Gujarat who strongly resisted Pepsi’s onslaught on their rights in 2019", she added.

INDIA

Farmers resist reforms designed to destroy livelihoods

© Getty Images Farmers resist reforms designed to destroy livelihoods


America loves family farmers and ranchers. Over generations, the status of small business farming endures indelibly within our identity. Most Americans who live in major metropolitan centers and the bucolic heartland alike celebrate agriculture with a profound sense of national pride.© Getty Images Farmers resist reforms designed to destroy livelihoods

Images of Norman Rockwell's iconic Saturday Evening Post covers immortalize a bygone era, which agronomists and sustainable farmers yearn to preserve. Our farmers emigrated to America during colonial times and through frontier culture eventually becoming modern, rural growers and urban producers who regularly pay homage to their roots elsewhere.


However, Sikh Americans bear witness to the plight of India's family farmers who agonize today under Prime Minister Narendra Modi's draconian, anti-farm laws. Indian Americans' deference to the rights of farmers has inspired recent rallies of solidarity, traversing California, New Jersey, Michigan and elsewhere. Across the Indian subcontinent, they endure widespread human rights abuses, for which Modi has been responsible for decades. Government-imposed agricultural reform laws jeopardize Indian farmers' livelihoods and ostensibly authorize starvation for millions. The escalating situation imperils peaceful protesters who have been attacked by Modi government forces, which could spark a geopolitical civil war.

So, how did this happen? Agribusiness and its people in Parliament railroaded small and midsize agricultural producers. Their scheme resulted in manipulating predetermined outcomes by preventing farmers from earning consistent profits. Masquerading laws with seemingly innocuous labels, the so-called "Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement on Price Assurance and Farm Services Act," "Essential Commodities (Amendment) Act" and the "Farmers' Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Act," farm-reform advocates and the Indian government alienated farmers from the legislative process by enacting deceptive reforms posing as enhancements.

Who believes Modi acted nobly to stop future threats of globalization and corporate farming? His free-market policies would undo economic norms. They burden family farmers with unnecessary risk or market uncertainty. Clearly, preserving India's Minimum Support Price (MSP) system would ensure price stability for local family farms. Purely ideological, the prime minister's deregulation unduly rewards agribusiness while laissez faire industry interests run amok. On the contrary, agribusiness credits the reforms as promising greater upward mobility for farmers.

These reform laws confirm that Modi's government favors agribusiness. By dissolving India's Mandi system, or farmers' auction, the reform laws could dismantle supply chains and yield farmers reduced incomes, blocking producers from earning guaranteed minimum prices at market, which eventually could allow coercive, private buyers to exercise complete discretion. Regulations previously safeguarded farms but now small producers and operators fear losing their businesses and lands to large, private investors. Some growers and fewer investigative journalists warned the Indian people against rising Hindu nationalism and corporations controlling the food industry.

Curiously, at a time of supposed deregulating agriculture policy, Modi's harsh reform laws spawned a domino effect that jeopardizes both the farmers' earnings and intimidates arhtiyas - the commissioned agents subsidizing farm loans and supporting adequate prices for crops. Small and large producers have enjoyed symbiotic dealings with these agents for decades. Yet, farmers are fighting to repeal austere reform laws and against returning India to its former, grim agrarian crisis. Meanwhile, farmers believe price assurances can protect them from exploitation at the hands of government-sponsored privatization. The new laws will ultimately force farmers to liquidate their products and lands to predator investors. Family farmers anticipate greedy, corporate interests waiting to easily seize control.

Indian farmers know prosperity starts with repealing biased laws to guarantee the MSP for crops and enacting more even-handed regulations. But the timing of the three anti-farmer reform laws is deceptive. COVID-19 helped the prime minister to endanger and coerce the Indian people, emboldening the government and Bharatiya Janata Party to force through reforms and render family farmers powerless to organize and resist them. Gone unchallenged, India's government insists its three new farm laws are vital to strengthen the agricultural industry. Modi's top economist obediently acquiesced.

Indian farmers' protest of agricultural reforms that became law in September is estimated to be one of the largest demonstrations in history. And Mondi's government countered by using water cannons and tear gas on supporters peacefully and lawfully marching against the new reform laws. Adding insult to injury, India negated democratic norms and violated citizens' basic rights while farmers marched towards Delhi. Rather than strengthening fairness for farmers, India's farmer protests expose Modi's anti-democratic values, anti-humanitarian policies and human rights violations intended to suppress the will of the people

Worse, India's news media operates like an arm of the government. Instead of acting as a watchdog and reporting impartially, the press rarely holds officials liable or exposes improprieties. On the UN's International Human Rights Day, Dec. 10, 2020, when Sikhs demanded activists and academics detained at protests be released, reflexively, Indian reporting branded peaceful protests as a plot by terrorists, and called farmers "leftist intellectuals" and "extremists" infiltrating "to derail farm law improvements."

India's democracy should not wreak havoc on human rights in the name of capitalism. No farmer should tolerate the government subjugating their livelihoods for profit.

Jagdeep Singh is executive director of UNITED SIKHS a 501(c)(3) non-profit and nonpartisan organization championing civil and human rights for all. They recognize the human race as one.

Farmers’ Protest in India Reignites: A Struggle for the Future of Food and Agriculture

(DIFFERENT THAN THE KULAK PROTESTS IN EUROPE)

by Colin Todhunter / February 18th, 2024

In 2021, after a year-long protest, India’s farmers brought about the repeal of three farm laws that were intended to ‘liberalise’ the agriculture sector. Now, in 2024, farmers are again protesting. The underlying issues and the facilitation of the neoliberal corporatisation of farming that sparked the previous protest remain and have not been resolved.

The World Bank, the World Trade Organization, global agribusiness and financial capital are working to corporatise India’s agriculture sector. This plan goes back to the early 1990s and India’s foreign exchange crisis, which was used (and manipulated) to set this plan in motion. This ‘structural adjustment’ policy and process involves displacing the current food production system with contract farming and an industrial model of agriculture and food retail that serves the above interests.

The aim is to reduce the role of the public sector in agriculture to a facilitator of private capital, which requires industrial commodity-crop farming. The beneficiaries will include Cargill, Archer Daniels Midlands, Louis Dreyfus, Bunge and India’s retail and agribusiness giants as well as the global agritech, seed and agrochemical corporations and the big tech companies with their ‘data-driven agriculture’.

The plan is to displace the peasantry, create a land market and amalgamate landholdings to form larger farms that are more suited to international land investors and industrial farming. As a result, there has been an ongoing strategy to make farming non-viable for many of India’s smallholder farmers and drive hundreds of millions out of farming and into urban centres that have already sprawled to form peri-urban areas, which often tend to contain the most agriculturally fertile land. The loss of such land should be a concern in itself.

And what will those hundreds of millions do? Driven to the cities because of deliberate impoverishment, they will serve as cheap labour or, more likely, an unemployed or underemployed reserve army of labour for global capital — labour which is being replaced with automation. They will be in search of jobs that are increasingly hard to come by the (World Bank reports that there is more than 23% youth unemployment in India).

The impoverishment of farmers results from rising input costs, the withdrawal of government assistance, debt and debt repayments and the impacts of cheap, subsidised imports, which depress farmers’ incomes.

While corporations in India receive massive handouts and have loans written off, the lack of a secure income, exposure to volatile and manipulated international market prices and cheap imports contribute to farmers’ misery of not being able to cover the costs of production and secure a decent standard of living.

The pressure from the richer nations for the Indian government to further reduce support given to farmers and open up to imports and export-oriented ‘free market’ trade is based on nothing but hypocrisy. For instance, according to policy analyst Devinder Sharma, subsidies provided to US wheat and rice farmers are more than the market worth of these two crops. He also notes that, per day, each cow in Europe receives a subsidy worth more than an Indian farmer’s daily income.

The World Bank, the World Trade Organization, global institutional investors and transnational agribusiness giants require corporate-dictated contract farming and full-scale neoliberal marketisation for the sale and procurement of produce. They demand that India sacrifice its farmers and its own food security for the benefit of a handful of billionaires.

Farmers are merely regarded as producers of raw materials (crops) to be fleeced by suppliers of chemical and biotech inputs and the food processing and retail conglomerates. The more farmers can be squeezed, the greater the profits these corporations can extract. This entails creating farmer dependency on costly external inputs and corporate-dominated markets and supply chains. Global agrifood corporations have cleverly and cynically weaved a narrative that equates eradicating food sovereignty and creating dependency with ‘food security’.

Farmers’ demands

In 2018, a charter was released by the All India Kisan Sangharsh Coordination Committee (an umbrella group of around 250 farmers’ organisations). The farmers were concerned about the deepening penetration of predatory corporations and the unbearable burden of indebtedness and the widening disparities between farmers and other sectors.

They wanted the government to take measures to bring down the input costs of farming, while making purchases of farm produce below the minimum support price (MSP) both illegal and punishable.

The charter also called for a special discussion on the universalisation of the public distribution system, the withdrawal of pesticides that have been banned elsewhere and the non-approval of genetically engineered seeds without a comprehensive need and impact assessment.

Other demands included no foreign direct investment in agriculture and food processing, the protection of farmers from corporate plunder in the name of contract farming, investment in farmers’ collectives to create farmer producer organisations and peasant cooperatives and the promotion of agroecology based on suitable cropping patterns and local seed diversity revival.

These demands remain relevant today due to government inaction. In fact, the three farm laws that were repealed after a year-long protest by farmers in 2021 aimed to do precisely the opposite. They were intended to expose Indian agriculture to a massive dose of neoliberal marketisation and shock therapy. Although the laws were struck down, the corporate interests behind them never went away and are adamant that the Indian government implements the policies they require.

This would mean India reducing the state procurement and distribution of essential foodstuffs and eradicating its food buffer stocks — so vital to national food security — and purchasing the nation’s needs with its foreign exchange reserves on manipulated global commodity markets. This would make the country wholly dependent on attracting foreign investment and international finance.

To ensure food sovereignty and national food security, the Mumbai-based Research Unit for Political Economy (RUPE) says that MSPs, through government procurement of essential crops and commodities, should be extended to many major cops such as maize, cotton, oilseed and pulses. At the moment, only farmers in certain states who produce rice and wheat are the main beneficiaries of government procurement at the MSP.

Since per capita protein consumption in India is abysmally low and has fallen further during the liberalisation era, the provision of pulses in the public distribution system (PDS) is long overdue and desperately needed. The PDS works with central government, via the Food Corporation of India, being responsible for buying food grains from farmers at MSPs at state-run market yards or mandis. It then allocates the grains to each state. State governments then deliver to ‘ration shops’.

Today, in 2024, farm union leaders are (among other demands) seeking guarantees for a minimum purchase price for crops. Although the government announces support prices for more than 20 crops each year, government agencies buy only rice and wheat at the support level and, even then, in only some states.

State agencies buy the two staples at government-fixed minimum support prices to build reserves to run the world’s biggest food welfare programme that entitles more than 800 million Indians to free rice and wheat. Currently, that’s more than half the population who per household will receive five kilos per month of these essential foodstuffs for at least the next four years, which would be denied to them by the ‘free market’. As we have seen throughout the world, corporate plunder under the guise of neoliberal marketisation is no friend of the poor and those in need who rely on state support to exist.

If public procurement of a wider range of crops at the MSP were to occur — and MSPs were guaranteed for rice and wheat across all states — it would help address hunger and malnutrition, encourage crop diversification and ease farmer distress. Indeed, as various commentators have stated, by helping hundreds of millions involved in farming this way, it would give a massive boost to rural spending power and the economy in general.

Instead of rolling back the role of the public sector and surrendering the system to what constitutes a transnational billionaire class and its corporations, there is a need to further expand official procurement and public distribution.

The RUPE notes, it would cost around 20% of the current handouts (‘incentives’) received by corporations and their super-rich owners, which do not benefit the bulk of the wider population in any way. It is also worth considering that the loans provided to just five large corporations in India were in 2016 equal to the entire farm debt.

However, it is clear that the existence of the MSP, the public distribution system and publicly held buffer stocks are an impediment to global agribusiness interests.

Farmers’ other demands include a complete debt waiver, a pension scheme for farmers and farm labourers, the reintroduction of subsidies scrapped by the Electricity (Amendment) Bill 2020 and the right to fair compensation and transparency concerning land acquisitions.

In the meantime, the current administration is keen to demonstrate to international finance capital and agricapital that it is being tough on farmers and remains steadfast in its willingness to facilitate the pro-corporate agenda.

After the recent breakdown in talks between government and farmers’ representatives, the farmers decided to peacefully march to and demonstrate in Delhi. But at the Delhi border, farmers were met with barricades, tear gas and state violence.

Farmers produce humanities’ most essential need and are not the ‘enemy within’. The spotlight should fall on the ‘enemy beyond’. Instead of depicting farmers as ‘anti-national’, as sections of the media and prominent commentators in India try to, the focus needs to be on challenging those interests that seek to gain from undermining India’s food security and sovereignty and the impoverishment of farmers.

Note: The issues discussed in the above article are set out in the author’s free-to-read book (2022), which can be accessed at Academia.edu and Global Research

Colin Todhunter is an independent writer specialising in development, food and agriculture. You can read his new e-book Food, Dependency and Dispossession: Resisting the New World Order for free here. Read other articles by Colin.

CANADA

Hundreds rally outside Indian consulate in solidarity with protesting farmers

© Talia Ricci/CBC Demonstrators hold signs in solidarity with farmers in India, who say new agriculture laws will slash their crop prices and result in their exploitation.

Hundreds of people gathered in front of the Indian consulate in downtown Toronto on Saturday to show their support for farmers in India who are protesting new laws they say will destroy their livelihoods.

Those who organized at the consulate are Canadians in the Sikh community who say the farmers work tirelessly to feed India and the world — and that the farmers need support now more than ever as their right to peacefully protest has been blocked by police who've used methods like tear gas, batons and water cannons against them.

"Our farmers are the backbone of our nation. This issue has hit close to home ... their lives matter to us, " protester Mansi Kaur said over the sound of dozens of car horns sounding off at the rally.

Kaur gathered with hundreds of others who were wearing masks and holding signs in support of the farmers, with slogans like "Justice for Farmers" and "No Farmers, No Food." Others remained in their cars at the demonstration.

She said she was there with others to protest three new laws in India that they say will see crop prices slashed and farmers exploited by large corporations.

Thousands of farmers in India have been camping out on the outskirts of the capital for the past 10 days until the new agriculture laws are withdrawn. They are heading towards New Delhi as they continue their calls.

Farmers had also been protesting the laws for nearly two months in Punjab and Haryana states.

India's government failed to break a deadlock with farmers on Saturday and will meet again on Wednesday, the agriculture minister and union leaders said.

Farmers have long been considered the heart and soul of India, where agriculture supports more than half of the country's 1.3 billion people, but the farmers have also seen their economic clout diminish over the last three decades.

The Indian government said the purpose of the legislation is to bring reform that will allow farmers to market their produce and boost production through private investment.

© Anushree Fadnavis/Reuters

Farmers have been camping along at least five major highways on the outskirts of the India's capital and have said they won't leave until the government rolls back new agricultural laws.

Farmers fear the legislation will eventually dismantle India's regulated markets and stop the government from buying wheat and rice at guaranteed prices, leaving them to negotiate with private buyers. The are calling for the government to repeal the laws and retain mandatory government purchases, among other demands.

"It would be like if we went to work, and there was no longer a minimum wage," said Nanki Kaur, who was also at the rally in Toronto. "They feed us. It's up to us to stand up for them."
Solidarity from the Sikh diaspora in Canada

Jaskaran Sandhu, director of administration at the World Sikh Organization of Canada, said the protests happening in India are "historic" and images from the protests have deeply affected those in the Sikh disapora in Canada.

"For all of us here, we have family and friends back home. So when we watch the images of police brutality, when we watch the images and the videos from on the ground of water cannons and tear gasses and charges from the police with sticks, it really hurts us," he said.

But Sandhu said it's also been inspiring to see the perseverance of the farmers who are continuing to assert their right to peacefully protest, despite the actions from police.

© Michael Charles Cole/CBC 

Supporters hold a sign that reads 'No Farmers, No Food' outside the Indian consulate in Toronto.

Sandhu added that many of those at the Toronto rally have family that are at the protests in India, including seniors, which has made the situation scary to watch from afar.

"As Canadians, as Sikhs and Punjabis living here in the diaspora, we want to ensure that our people are safe and the right to peaceful protest is protected," Sandhu said, adding that those in the community across Canada are having these same conversations in their households.

Car rallies have also been organized in cities like Vancouver and Ottawa to show solidarity, Sandhu said. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's comments earlier this week that called the Indian government's response to protesters "concerning" was a large help as well, he said.

Those comments led to a swift reaction from officials in India who said the Trudeau was "ill-informed." Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his ministers have also framed the farmers as "anti-national"— a term the government has long used against its critics.

"We need folks to stand up and speak out so the Indian government knows they're being watched," Sandhu said.
Blankets, menstruation kits among supplies sent by fundraising group

Along with rallying, Sikh communities in Canada have been supporting the protesters in India by sending them supplies to continue their efforts, said Gurpartap Singh Toor, a volunteer with Khalsa Aid Canada.

"There's been an overwhelming amount of support," he said.

© Michael Charles Cole/CBC 

'This issue has hit close to home ... their lives matter to us,' one demonstrator in Toronto said.

The fundraising group is focusing on bolstering the health and safety of the demonstrating farmers, Toor said. Khalsa Aid Canada has sent fire extinguishers — as the farmers are cooking on the ground as they camp out — as well as devices to spray down the campsites to prevent mosquito bites that can sometimes cause illnesses.

Toor said menstruation kits have also been sent due to an "unprecedented" number of women at the protests, along with portable washrooms to provide safe and private spaces for women to use the bathroom. The cold weather at night has also been an issue, so Toor said the organization has sent blankets and shelters for the farmers, particularly for the seniors who are protesting.

"I would say a lot of people from Canada have family that are at the protests right now ... safety is the biggest concern," he said, adding that the fear of continued police violence remains high.

Toor said the farmers have asked him and others to create as much public awareness about the issue as possible. "It brings a lot of global eyes on India, so the government knows if they act with a bad intent, then the world is watching," he said.

Why India’s protesting farmers are right in fearing their livelihoods

Government wants to transition to a private system without a safety net for farmers

Published: December 10, 2020  Shivam Vij, Special to Gulf News
DILLI DUR AST

Farmer leaders address media after a meeting near Singhu border in New Delhi on Wednesday .Image Credit: PTI

The government of India has enacted three laws to ‘reform’ the country's agriculture. Taken together, they will radically alter how India’s agrarian economy works. Whether this radical change will be for better or worse is up for debate.

Many farmers think these laws will be their ruin, and are currently laying siege to Delhi. They have set up protest sites on Delhi’s borders. It takes a lot to leave the comfort of your home and say you will live on the highways, for weeks and months if needed, in the middle of a pandemic and braving water canons.

India’s Green Revolution

Attempts to defame these farmers have not worked. The allegations have been criminal, because these are the farmers who toiled very hard to give food security to a nation which once had to spend precious foreign exchange to import basic foodgrains and feed its hungry millions. Solving that problem is known as India’s Green Revolution, circa 1960s.

To give India food security, these farmers in Punjab and Haryana grew paddy in places that were not suited for it. Their groundwater has been vanishing away in the paddy crops. The fertilisers and chemicals they use to increase their yield has caused high rates of cancer. Today we are labelling these hardworking farmers as terrorists. Shame on us.

These farmers undertook the Green Revolution exercise not out of charity. They were promised fixed incomes, known in bureaucratic lingo as Minimum Support Price. While given for around 22 crops, the bulk of the budget is spent in procuring wheat, rice and pulses. The procurement is done by the Food Corporation of India. The FCI ends up procuring more than what the people of India can consume, so some of the foodgrains rot. The MSP rates and the amount of procurement the government does is a political issue heating up before every election, since it affects the income of farmers.

Not all farmers sell their produce to the FCI for the fixed MSP. But how many do? An old estimate says only 6% farmers benefit from the MSP system but a recent estimation by Harish Damodaran in the Indian Express has shown the figure is at least 15% and could be as much as 25%.

There’s little doubt that most beneficiaries of the MSP system are in Punjab and Haryana. That’s why they are the most prosperous farmers in India. An average farming family in Punjab earns five times an average farming family in Bihar, according to 2013 government report. That’s why it is mainly farmers from these two states who are protesting, though if you are willing to see beyond propaganda you will see groups of farmers across India who are expressing apprehensions about these new laws.

A complicated process

Farmers sell their produce to the government through marketplaces known as the Agricultural Produce Marketing Committees, or APMCs. It is difficult for the private sector to procure crops through these APMCs. They need a separate license in every state, and that’s only the beginning of the complicated process.

It is laudable that the government wants to make it easier for the private sector to enter foodgrains procurement. It would give farmers more choice, infuse private capital in agricultural marketing, the investments could help improve supply chains and exports. Farmers are not opposed to this.

What they re opposed to is that the new laws virtually make it unviable for the APMCs to function. No, the government isn’t banning APMCs or shutting them down. The fear is that the clever bureaucratic language of the laws is designed to make the APMCs economically unviable. In other words, farmers won’t have choice. They’ll only have the private sector. Used to the certainty of MSPs, they could now be at the mercy of private companies. A seller’s market could become a buyer’s market.

There is some evidence of this: Bihar abolished APMCs in 2006, and no, the private sector hasn’t brought great prosperity to Bihar’s farmers. No farmers from Punjab and Haryana are rushing to Bihar to enjoy the free market.

Under the new laws, a private player needs nothing more than an Income Tax registration to go and buy foodgrains anywhere from any farmer in India. Fabulous ease of business. But please note that in other sectors the government wants to record data of pricing and sales through a complex and much-maligned Goods and Services Tax.

One extreme to another

The farm reforms the government is proposing take us from one extreme of government deciding prices to another extreme where the government may not even know how much a private company is buying crops for. This has great implications for farmers’ incomes, as farmers will be weak in dealing with big corporations. Worse, it has implications for managing food inflation, crucial for a poor country like India.

The government insists the APMCs and the MSP system will continue but you can’t blame farmers for not believing the government when it enacts a law that says farmers won’t be allowed to approach a civil court for dispute resolution with a private buyer. That sounds unconstitutional.

The government says it is now willing to remove this clause but the fact that it was there in the first place tells you why farmers were apprehensive. It was clear the government wanted the balance of power to be in favour of the private companies, tilted against the power. What kind of a democracy creates a law saying the writ of courts don’t apply to commercial disputes in agriculture?

In the end, it boils down to lack of trust. Farmers want nothing less than a complete repeal of all these 3 laws. They are not willing to believe a government that imposed these laws overnight through ordinances and later hurriedly pushed them through parliament. That the government didn’t consult farmers, try to create a consensus or listen to the opposition’s objections has added to the woes. We ought to treat our food providers with a little more dignity.