ORDINANCES, NOT ORDINARY

 The ordinances rushed up by Modi govt. may help in growth of agro-based farming but may be failed to help or empower farmer. The introduction of very new players whether private players (private mandies, private companies etc) or contract farming may change the modes of orthodox farming system but a lot of things are on the sake of to be messed up very badly...

These ordinances are not ordinary as the proof act that BJP own BKS(Bhartiya Kisan Sangh) didn't support Mr. Modi and its cabinet and deny all the virtual facts tried by NDA. The farmers all over India but specially from Punjab & Haryana agitate against these ordinances, so we need a reality check of these 3 ordinances who made a stand off b/w GOI and farmers...

1. THE FARMER PRODUCE TRADE & COMMERCE (PROMOTION & FACILATION) BILL, 2020

Since 1947, our agriciltural distribution system was most disturbed system and the man behind the whole show were big money lenders (zimmidars) and famously called LICENSED MAFIAS then and govt. was not in any authority to have cantrols on such so called MAFIAS...

So govt. decided to establish APMC (Agriculture Produce Market Committee). Acc. to this the states or particularly districts were planned to be divided in small areas (mandies) and middlemen were established with govt. approoved licenses called arthiyas and govt. was somehow successful to had cantrol on such MAFIAS. But if we talk about this very 1st ordinance, this shall be discussed in 2 scenerios...

SCENERIO(1):- In this ordinance, the private and corporate players will be newcomers and middlemen (arthiyas) can be given their farewell. The big corporate players will have the direct approach to visit the farmer to purchase their crop and the commission system will be abolished and this may be benificial to both farmers and buyers like us. 

SCENERIO(2):- But every coin has 2 flips like anything. History is witnessed that corporate players are always profit making players. It is quite possible that farmers might get attractable prices in starting of the new system but by the time they might get decieved by these private players. As we take the instance of communication sector like JIO who jumped in 2016 and changed the whole face of communication sector by providing free data & ranked India in one of the finest communication sectors of the world but govt. sectors like BSNL, MTNL got extinct and now the JIO has almost whole market force in its hand and has monopoly in communication sector of India. Sly these monopoly could establish in private mandies too and farmer will be forced to sell their crops at their (corporate companies) instinct.

2. THE FARMERS (EMPOWERMENT & PROTECTION) AGREEMENT ON PRICE ASSURANCE & FARM SERVICES BILL,2020

This ordinance talks about contract farming where any company or any big corporate party can make contract directly with farmer. This bill has made serious concern to farmers for MSP(Minimum Support Price). If APMC mandies gets demolished and govt. would have no cantrol on these private authorities, soon there will be large market monopoly forces which will tend to refurbish the whole agricultural sector of India. The farmers demanded GOI to link contract farming to MSP to shatter the exploitation of certainly small scale farmers.

3. ESSENTIAL COMMODITIES (AMENDMENT) BILL, 2020

The essential commodities act was introduced in 1971 to prevent the hoarding of black markeeting. Earlier many middlemen (arthiyas) and big buyers tend to store their purchase over their capacity. As a result, the market had to face large scarcity of that particular and demand would have got risen which in consequence the risen in price of that particular thing. So the govt. brought ECA(Essential Commodities Act) which clearly stated that any buyer would be able to store their purchase over a certain limit, if above the capacity the purchase is found then that stock will be illuminated as illegal and buyer would have to face legal actions.

But again GOI has eliminated all the restrictions opposing the storage of their purchase and in tends to give free hand to buyers to store their purchase limitlessly and this may bring again black market era in agricultural sector...

MY OPINION:-

The GOI should make reforms in APMC but should not deny the whole agricultural mandi system. The contract farming is better initiative to empower the farmers but MSP must be linked with contract prices to avoid exploitation of farmers from corporates. The govt. made huge announcements about the elimination of geographical restrictions but again govt. failed to convience about provision regarding transportational cost which ought to be managed by govt. We all know that time demands changes and involment of private buyers is not bad but mandies should be treated as PSU's where govt. should be a watchdog over the private players and the forum should be compiled for the mediation b/w farmers and private buyers.