In Lakhimpur Kheri, Uttar Pradesh, the death of the farmers involved in the farmers’ protest is turning into a political turmoil. Four farmers who went on a peaceful protest march were crushed from behind by the miscreants’ vehicle without any provocation. Efforts to prevent politicization of the incident led to the crackdown on political parties and leaders trying to access the site. The blame for the turn of events should lie with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government of Uttar Pradesh, which has again brought to the notice of farmers’ protest.
The current agitation in Lakhimpur is part of a mobilization by a united front of several farmer groups that lasted for 10 months. What has surprised many people is its longevity. This is because the agricultural laws of 2020 are technically under a stay of the Supreme Court and there has been no push by the government to implement them, or even to vacate the stay. In the interim, the government has invoked the Essential Commodities Act twice in violation of its commitments set forth in three agricultural laws. Clearly, farmers’ protests today have less to do with calls for withdrawal of the laws than with broader concerns over issues related to sustainability of farming and agricultural livelihoods. In this sense it has emerged as a major protest.
It is important to reiterate that the push-back started after three agriculture laws were enacted through Parliament without consultation with the sector’s stakeholders. But farmers’ protests have been going on in different parts of the country for the last five years. A mobilization in Maharashtra saw two long marches. Similar demonstrations were witnessed in Karnataka, Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan and many other states. In Madhya Pradesh, farmers were fired upon in 2017 in which seven farmers were killed. The reasons for these protests were different but had a common theme. The common concern is the declining profitability of farming, driven by rising cost of cultivation, weak farm-gate prices and withdrawal or dilution of available security from the state. The fact that these are neither isolated nor hypothetical is evident in the Situation Assessment Survey of Agricultural Households for 2018-19 by the National Statistical Office. Not only has Indian income from farming declined in real terms between 2012-13 and 2018-19, it has pushed a significant majority from farmers to wage-labour, with casual wage income adding to the total income of farmers. Its share has increased. With jobs drying up in non-agricultural sectors, there has been an increase in the number of workers in the agricultural sector, resulting in a fall in per worker income. Rural wages have also been falling in real terms in the last three years, adding to the hardships of the farmers.
The angry farmers seem to be trying to malign and spoil their protest. This was visible in the early months, when there were demands to link his movement to foreign elements. This process is going on, while efforts to negotiate with the farmers have been in vain. Even the report of the Supreme Court-appointed committee has not been shared publicly, with no further effort on the part of the judiciary.
The apathy by the government is widely seen as deliberate, given the nature of policy changes that seek to bolster the hands of private corporate operators interested in entering India’s large agri-commodities market. For months, protesters have expressed their opposition to corporate entrants. Absence of consultation with farmers and the disrepute of farmer unions has increased the trust deficit between farmers and policy makers. Such a situation may not be conducive to allowing and facilitating greater market penetration and participation of private companies. Instead, it is likely to contribute to farmer resistance to all the reforms in the agriculture sector proposed by the government.
At a time when the agriculture sector is undergoing rapid transformation, such a lack of trust is unlikely to help build consensus for structural changes in the agriculture sector. Growing distrust of the private sector in the midst of growing inequality may hinder further reforms in other sectors as well.
Since farmers as well as other people dependent on agriculture still make up about two-thirds of the country, prolonged protests can turn into social and political unrest. Even more so given the large pool of unemployed youth in rural areas, who have only a small chance of being meaningfully absorbed by an economy reeling from recession and pandemic-induced economic distress. In times of such a multidimensional crisis, the confrontational attitude of the governments towards the agri-protesters will only strengthen their movement.
Himanshu is Associate Professor at Jawaharlal Nehru University and Visiting Fellow at Center de Sciences Humanes, New Delhi
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