Farm laws: Reforms by regressive ways?

Spoiling the key, using the pickaxe

Many of the actions of our governments, both at the Centre and in many states, remind you of an ancient fable about a cock and a cat, attributed to Aesop. The cat is looking for any pretext to make a meal out of the cock. It accuses the cock of disturbing people every morning with its crowing. The cock argues that it is serving people and its activities benefit society. But the cat ends the dialogue observing that it is now her breakfast time. "Cats don't live on dialogue." Neither do monarchs. But democracies function effectively only through dialogue and discourse.

The three farm laws rammed through Parliament and given Presidential assent in a hurry have incurred the wrath of farmers, mainly from Punjab and Haryana, who have been protesting for two weeks and have laid siege to Delhi. Opposition parties across the country and many trade bodies and unions are opportunistically supporting their agitation, reminiscent of when a moribund BJP revived itself by jumping onto the Anna Hazare-led India Against Corruption bandwagon. Now the boot is on the other foot. The ruling party is trying to discredit the farmers, comprising of a large body of sturdy, stout and hearty Sikhs, and attempting to drive a wedge between different farmers’ groups.

The farm bills contain far-reaching reforms that could be of benefit to small farmers, who comprise 85% of the farming community. One law unshackles the farmer from the clutches of the APMC mandis and frees him from strangulation by the cartels of brokers and traders in nexus with government inspectors by allowing him to sell where he wants and to whom he chooses anywhere in the country, through physical markets or from his farm gate or via e-markets. The second does away with the Essential Commodities Act and its restrictions on those crops that came under it, allowing greater leeway both in the free movement and storage of produce. The third law is aimed at contract farming directly with farmers and encourages start-ups to innovate and create new markets -- domestic and exports -- which are presumed to attract massive investments by corporates in procurement, processing and cold storages. These laws together are expected to result in better prices for farmers, by reducing wastage of perishables and by increasing competition among buyers, and also pave way for massive employment in agriculture. The laws do not per se seek to dismantle APMCs or do away with Minimum Support Price (MSP). This, in essence, is the premise of the three laws.

Howsoever noble the intentions, though, we know from the past that these issues pertaining to agriculture are so intricate and complex that there is no silver bullet to solve them by just passing ordinances or ramming laws through Parliament. Reforms, to be successful, need continuous tweaking to remove bottlenecks, while preventing the formation of cartels.

The three laws are important and are inextricably entwined. They will have far reaching impact on farming practices, the livelihood of farmers and farm labourers, supply chain linkages from the farm to retail shelves to your dinner plate. They could turbocharge agriculture start-ups and giant corporates and interconnect the millions of small-time traditional buyers, wholesalers and agents who all form part of the tangled web that will continue to be the backbone of our economy for many years to come.

There are also the ancient weekly village fairs and local markets, as old as our hills, which are probably the best free markets that give access to farmers and artisans to sell their farm produce and vend their pots, their baskets and wares, and also help them market their cattle, sheep, and poultry and pigs as well as buy their weekly needs. And there are the APMC yards, instituted in the 1960s, which serve a good purpose in a number of states, are absent in a few states, and are an anomaly in many other states, having become moribund and cesspools of corruption.

Let us also remember that there are only a limited number of crops that come under the APMC. There are dozens of other crops, fruits and vegetables, flowers and livestock and dairy produce that affect more farmers than those whose crops come under the APMC Act. These crops are not eligible for the government’s MSP, and complaints persist that these benefits are not reaching such farmers.

We must recognise that the bills can do enormous good but also have many attendant dangers. Government monopolies like the APMCs are inefficient and indifferent to customers The private sector, on the other hand, maybe efficient but it's a rapacious, predatory monster. There are legitimate concerns that let alone MNCs, Indian corporates and crony capitalists could turn out to be unscrupulous and venal when they become monopolies or form cartels. There is a genuine fear that APMCs may collapse as a result of these laws and farmers will then be at the mercy of large business houses who will eliminate competition and prey on them -- a trend that started long ago and has steadily grown, with the increasing influence of a few big business houses on government policy. When procurement through MSP is delayed or denied, farmers under duress will fall into the clutches of corporations run by oligarchs. The unsolved question is, therefore, how to ensure that the reforms do not lead to monopolies or cartelisation

Equally important is the issue of federalism. Agriculture is a state subject under the Constitution, and the states play a critical role in the sector, but they have scarcely been involved in the framing and passing of the laws.

When leaders in government admit that they may not have all the answers, that no one has a magic formula for societal and economic problems, it will open up avenues for dialogue and debate and lead to faster, amicable and simpler solutions through consensus instead of conflict.

Tagore's lines of penetrating insight may serve us well: "The world suffers most from the disinterested tyranny of the well-wisher...the clumsiness of power spoils the key and uses the pickaxe."

(The writer is a farmer, soldier and pioneer of low-cost airlines in India)