Ludhiana: Farmer union leaders submitted a memorandum to Warring on the Centre’s draft policy

Ludhiana: As per the decision taken by the Samyukta Kisan Morcha, members of various farmers’ organisations today met Ludhiana MP Amrinder Singh Raja Waring and handed over a memorandum to him. The Morcha has decided to agitate against the Centre’s draft National Policy Framework on Agricultural Marketing, which aims to reform agricultural marketing in India. The policy was released by the Union agriculture ministry for public comments. Bharatiya Kisan Union (Ekta Ugrahan) general secretary termed the draft policy as a reincarnation of the three repealed farm laws and said it was being imposed through the backdoor through state governments. “This policy is anti-farmer,” said the SKM, an umbrella body of farm unions. The SKM had led a massive agitation in 2020-21, forcing the government to repeal the three controversial agri-marketing laws.

All India Kisan Sabha president Chamkaur Singh said the new policy was an attack on government-backed markets and aimed at privatising them to help multinational corporations. They alleged that the new policy will help big companies control the agri-retail trade and agro-processing industry. Farm leader Hardev Singh Sandhu said, “The National Policy Framework on Agricultural Marketing has no provision for MSP declaration, government procurement and food storage for supply to the public distribution system. It only caters to buffer stock.” On the proposal to integrate both private and public sectors through advanced technologies like digital public infrastructure, block chain, machine learning and artificial intelligence, farmer union leaders said these reforms also propose to eliminate regulation, allowing the private sector, especially corporate agri-businesses, to dominate production, processing and marketing.