1) The Farmers' Produce Trade and commerce ( Promotion and Facilitation) Bill
2) The Essential Commodities (Amendment) Bill
3) The Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement on Price Assurance and Farm Services Bill.
All three continue to become LAWS later on as they were passed by Lok sabha (the lower house of parliament) on 17 September 2020 by Rajya Sabha( the upper house of Parliament) on 20 September 2020 and got their assent from the President Ram Nath kovind on 27 September 2020.
Although these laws are greatly controversial as Indian farmers continue to protest against these farm laws on the outskirts of Delhi and have been sitting on Singhu border, Tikri border, Gazipur border and various other borders blocking the National capital yet the Indian government continues to say these laws are in favour of farmers.
Now let us delve a bit deeper and study what is it that compels indian farmers to sit on roads for as long as over 120 days ( as per 10 april 2020) starting from 26 November 2020 when they tried to enter the national capital in order to express their dissent towards the government laws:-
1) The first law i.e. The Farmers Produce Trade and Commerce (promotion and facilitation) act allows farmers to sell they produced outside APMC .
What is APMC?? Is this concept prevalent all over India?
APMC stands for agriculture produce Market Committee.. Basically it is a place where farmers sell their crops.
When it comes to the question that whether this concept is prevalent all over India then the answer is an emphatic NO !
APMC markets are popularly known as Mandis is in North India.
A picture of APMC may help you make the image more clear. It's a place where the crops are sold by bus on MSP minimum support price ( the MINIMUM price ...to be read again MINIMUM price ..set by government on approximately 22 crops but nearly only 3-4 crops are sold on MSP in reality where is MSP on the remaining crops continue to be only on papers and not on ground)
APMC came when in 1970 green revolution in India to place the major States with green revolution took place were Indian states namely Punjab, Haryana, Western Uttar Pradesh and parts of Rajasthan ..29 states of India have APMC Mandis or we can say well established physical infrastructure where farmers sell their harvest government or to other people but on MSP.. But this concept is quite well-established because the above mentioned states largely produce Rice, wheat, cotton, which are the 3-4 crops amongst 22 listed that actually get MSP... Hence, farmers of Punjab, Haryana, Western Uttar Pradesh and parts of Rajasthan largely benefit from APMC concept.. Resultantly you will here find farmers that are not poor and belong to well to do families have their own SUVs, their children read in good schools ... All thanks to the Great indian scientist Mr MS Swaminathan.
Coming back to the point, it is the ground reality that outside APMC farmers have no other place to sell their produce because outside APMC their harvest is purchased on MSP, this example of this is other Indian states such as Bihar and Eastern Uttar Pradesh.. The farmers owing 10 acres of land in Bihar comes to Punjab and Haryana to earn their livelihood wheread farmer owing 10 acres in Punjab and Haryana is financially far more stronger and provides labour to the farmers of Bihar. The reason behind is punjab and Haryana have infrastructure of APMC a place where they sell reproduce whereas farmer of Bihar does not have any particular place to send his or her crops and they have to forcibly sell to private retailers who purchase it on their own price. For instance, MSP of wheat is INR 19.25 per kg this is the price on which farmers of Punjab and Haryana sell their wheat in APMC.. Whereas of Bihar sell their wheat harvest at nearly 10 or 11 INR per kg..
This is one of the major reason reasons why farmers from Northern States are protesting largely.
2) Moving onto the second act-- The Essential Commodities (Amendment) Act which is an amendment to the existing law. This law gives power to the private traders to store ample amount of food in their cold stores without any consent of the government.
Farmer are apprehensive that by doing this private traders will Store ample amount of crops in their stores, prices of essential commodities will fluctuate unevenly and this will give rise to inflation on large scale which further will increase hunger in the country. The government has stated in the Act that government will not be interfering unless there is 100% rise in the price of a commodity.
For instance price of onion this year is Rs.100 per kg , the government will intervene only if the price of onion next year is set at rupees 200 per kg.. If the price is marked at 199 per kg then the government will have no right to interfere. The major concern of common citizen lies here.. They say the private trader would raise the price by 99% .. after all 1% hardly makes any difference to them.. But 99% increase would make large difference to the common man..
3) The third law namely -- The Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) agreement on price insurance and farm services act.
This law is mainly about contract farming that farmers have to undergo a contract with the private trader. And all the rules and regulations will be stated by the private trader. it states that whatever the trader says that same crop will be grown by the farmer and if the trader finds that the quality of crop is not up to the mark after the crop has been produced.. after farmer has invested large amount on it's growth.
The trader may refuse to buy it. The farmer Will have no right to go to the court, at most the farmer can approach SDM office...
Along with farmers of Punjab Haryana and western Uttar Pradesh, farmers of eastern Uttar Pradesh and Bihar namely Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh have also joined the protest in large numbers in order to voice the injustice done to farmers in the country over the years and bring into light the exploitation they have faced since ages.
It is yet to be seen what will be the conclusion of this farming protest..
#NO_FARMERS#NO_FOOD
