Farmers hold protest, rejects meager paddy MSP hike of Rs.53 by Centre
Ferozepur, June 2, 2020: In protest against the meager hike of Rs 53 in MSP for paddy, the Punjab Kisan Sangharsh Committee today burn the effigy of the Centre and state governments, saying instead the Centre should have adopted the formula forwarded by the Chairman, National Commission for Farmers, Dr MS Swaminathan, under which farmers are assured of MSP which accounts for the basic costs incurred on production plus 50% profit on that.
The farmer’s organization threatened to hold massive protest on June 8 in front of the DC office. They demanded the minimum support price of paddy as Rs.3650. Even the Chief Minister, Punjab has rejected the paddy MSP hike, terming it totally inadequate and paltry and the Centre had failed to address the extreme distress faced by the farmers amid the Covid crisis.
Satnam Singh Pannu, State President and Sarwan Singh Pandher, General Secretary, PKSC said the farmers had suffered a loss during the corona threat period, the prices of vegetables, milk, fruits etc have drastically gone down as compared to the increase in prices of inputs like fertilizers and insecticides and pesticides. Modi government during the last year had increased Rs.100 per qtl and with the meager hike of Rs.53, the recommendations of Dr Swaminathan had been completely ignored.
They demanded to implement Dr.Swaminathan report and announce the rates of 23 commodities besides making adequate arrangements for its marketing to avoid unnecessary harassment to the farmers. Stressing on to cancel the amendments in the Agriculture Production Market Committee Act for giving he agriculture mandis to the private companies also demanded the special package of Rs.10 lakh crore for the farmers.
According to the recommendations approved by the Union cabinet, the MSP of paddy (common) is Rs 1,868, an increase of Rs 53 from Rs 1,815 last year and paddy (Grade-A) is Rs 1,888 (Rs 1,835 in 2019).
We reject the commission’s recommendations to offer peanuts by increasing paddy MSP by Rs 53 this year in which decisions have been taken while sitting in air-conditioned rooms without any reality check on the ground, they added.