#devinder sharma

A few days back, 10 indebted farmers from Hingoli district in Maharashtra made a unique but strange plea to the Chief Minister. They were willing to put their body organs to auction so as to pay back loans to the nationalised banks from the money so raised. They offered to sell their body organs, and in fact had a 'rate card' ready - Rs 90,000 for liver, Rs 75,000 for a kidney and Rs 25,000 for an eye. While this strange offer did create a ruckus in the Maharashtra Assembly, it was all forgotten after a few days. The tragedy being that anything that depicts agrarian distress is brushed away rather easily.

Against 10,881 farm suicides reported in 2021, NCRB recorded farm suicides to be 3.7 per cent higher in 2022 when a total of 11,290 farmers and farm workers took the fatal route. In 2022, of the 5,207 farmers who took their own lives, 208 were women. Similarly, of the 6,083 farm workers who committed suicide, 611 were women. Most suicides were reported from Maharashtra, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh. Maharashtra alone reported 38 per cent of the total farm suicides, recording 4,248 suicides.

A parliamentary panel on agriculture had, in a report tabled in parliament on March 23 this year, revealed that the government was far from its 2022 goal of doubling farm income. The panel said the average monthly agricultural household income had risen by a meagre amount of Rs 2,000 from Rs 8,059 in 2015-206 to Rs 10,218 in 2018-2019. Devinder Sharma, an agriculture expert, said farmers were unable to reap the "rightful income". "They are caught in the vicious debt cycle. The government must ensure direct income support to bail them out," he said.

Farm distress had been lingering on for decades now, and all that scientists and economists focused on was the need to raise crop productivity as the way to increase farm incomes. Not explaining that if this argument made any economic sense then why was agriculture in deep crisis in the rich developed countries where private investments had flowed in, and where productivity was amongst the highest in the world.

Markets have failed everywhere to enhance farm income, to provide a living income to farmers. A guaranteed income in the form of an assured MSP is what farmers are asking for. This is the real reform that will not only revitalise agriculture but will bring in rural prosperity. Moving beyond market fundamentalism, let us not be again swayed by biased newspaper editorials and the diatribe that TV anchors have relished against farmers. Let us for a change try to understand the reasons behind the farmers' outburst, and in our own little way call for economic justice for farmers.

More than 40 per cent of India's entire population relies on agriculture for their livelihoods, but the industry is rife with poverty. Agriculture expert Devinder Sharma said that's because most crops are already sold at market value. "We have deliberately kept agriculture impoverished," Mr Sharma said. "We have denied the farmers their rightful price for decades, and so the farmers' anger has been building up over the years." Many farmers in India also work relatively small plots of land, when compared to Australia or the United States. Small landowners fear they will be bought out by big corporations including Adani, which has caused controversy in Australia over its Carmichael coal mine. Protest leaders this week said they would boycott services and facilities owned by Adani and another Indian conglomerate, Reliance. "In the long term, [Mr Modi is] going to take our lands away," said Amar Singh, president of the Sikh charity Turbans 4 Australia. "Because of this land people are able to send their kids overseas to study. "The youth unemployment in India is astronomical. What's going to happen when the family farm is taken away?"

Farming in Punjab is more than a source of income. "In Punjab, the only culture is agriculture," Mr Sharma said. "Punjab is not only the food bowl of the country, but everything that Punjab does is linked to agriculture." Farmers currently enjoy minimum prices for wheat and rice, crops that are predominantly grown in Punjab and Haryana. They fear the floor prices for wheat and rice will be scrapped. Many are now pushing for stronger price controls. In the past two weeks protests have been held across Australia in support of the strikes. Turbans 4 Australia is one of a coalition of Indian diaspora groups involved in organising Australian protests. "We are concerned about the human rights abuse of peaceful protesters being showered with water cannons and tear gas cannons. After the Sikhs led the charge, everyone joined in," Mr Singh said. Samar Kohli, who organised a protest in Sydney's Martin Place, said while he's been in Australia for 20 years, this issue "hit close to home". "We all have families back in Punjab, we all have families that are into farming. [Scott] Morrison needs to listen as well. There are a lot of things happening in India that will eventually affect Australia." Mr Kohli said that Adani — a major donor of Mr Modi's BJP which has mining interests in Australia — was strongly in favour of the reforms. "There have been continuous human rights violations in India, [but Mr Morrison] hasn't raised his voice," Mr Kohli said.

Budgetary support for agriculture, despite many schemes being introduced over the years, has failed to translate in a profitable income for the farming community. The economic design is so cleverly cast that although farmers are hailed as food providers or annadatas, what they receive as support is a pittance. This is the primary reason why agriculture continues to struggle against all odds, and with each passing year the level of distress only grows. As I have repeatedly said: little do the farmers realise that when they undertake cultivation they actually end up cultivating losses.