Pride Defeat, Clash On Hold

NS Repeal of three agricultural laws by the central government, on friday, issue Historic victory of the peasant movement in India. For more than a year, Delhi was besieged by thousands of peasants, and their protest was slowly developing into a pan-India resistance movement. The late decisions by the government to repeal the laws, which, however, turn the curtains on the agitation in Delhi, are unlikely to dampen the political fervor left behind.

The central government’s response to the protests was marked by appalling and pride. Its focus was on making the narrative controlled and positive. Attempts were made to break up, divide, horse-trade, demean, defame and shame the protesters, who were easily branded as terrorists and Khalistanis. sedition cases registered against the protesters. hurled tear gas at the protest march, and the officers publicly asked the police to break the heads of protesters, In Lakhimpur Kheri, Uttar Pradesh, A vehicle was driven for a peaceful demonstration, killing many people. It is really good to resist and avoid such cruel reactions.

broader context

“Reform” in agriculture, advocated by right-wing economists After 1991, the focus was on dismantling the institutional support structures in Indian agriculture established after the 1960s. These support structures in prices, subsidies, credit, marketing, research and extension were instrumental in India’s achievement of food self-sufficiency between the 1960s and 1980s.

In agricultural marketing, the focus of the attack was Mandis Governed by Agricultural Produce Market Committee (APMC) Acts passed by state legislatures. It was argued that if India needed to diversify its cropping pattern into export-oriented and high value crops, Mandis There is a need to give way to private markets, futures markets and contract farming. The APMC Acts discriminated against farmers by not allowing them to interact directly with large corporate buyers and exporters. Therefore, the APMC Acts should be amended so that any private market or rural collection center can freely emerge anywhere without the approval of the local. Market or a. Pay Market taxes, and so as to popularize contract farming. Similarly, the advocacy of amendments to the Essential Commodities Act, 1955 rests on the idea that private corporate investment in warehousing and warehousing can be encouraged if stock limits for traders are relaxed.

It was a long standing constitutional consensus in India that agricultural marketing was the legislative domain of the state governments. Thus, in 2003, the central government prepared a model act on agricultural marketing and sent it to the states for passage in the state legislatures. This was followed by the preparation and dissemination of two more Model Acts in 2017 and 2018. These Model Acts were neither rejected nor welcomed. Several states selected certain clauses they found attractive and appropriate to their contexts, and accordingly amended their APMC Acts between 2003 and 2020. Only one state – Bihar – used this opportunity to completely repeal its APMC Act in 2006.

the laws were unconstitutional

Consensus broke down in 2020, when the central government took over the task of legislating on agricultural marketing and passed agricultural laws. Federal principles were violated as the central government invoked entry 33 of the Concurrent List to interfere with matters in entry 14, 26 and entry 27 of the State List. Agricultural laws also interfered with entry 28 of the State List, which was not subject to entry 33 of the Concurrent List. Thus, to begin with, agricultural laws were justly and properly argued for being unconstitutional.

However, the Supreme Court of India refused to expedite the petitions filed before it. Instead, in January 2021, without consulting the protesting farmer organisations, it appointed a committee of four persons, all of whom publicly declared their support for the agricultural laws. The farmers’ organizations on their part distanced themselves from the committee and continued their agitation.

Apart from constitutionality, the content of the agricultural laws was also widely criticized. The Bihar example shows that private investment in agricultural markets was unlikely to come in even if the APMC Acts were repealed. Indeed, from 2006 onwards, the exploitation of farmers by unscrupulous traders intensified in Bihar. Kerala never had an APMC Act.

Nevertheless, there was little presence of private investment in its agricultural markets. Maharashtra removed fruits and vegetables from the purview of APMC in 2016. Nevertheless, the inflow of private investment into agricultural markets was only modest. Thus, there was a possibility that a formal and regulated market could split itself into an informal and unregulated market if the APMC Acts were diluted. In addition, two other problems were highlighted. One, Market In states such as Punjab, taxes were used to fund investments in rural infrastructure. if Mandis are weak, what will be the alternative to such investments? Second, even if private markets do emerge, how will they address the structural problem of poor farm-gate aggregation of produce for small and marginal farmers? Will one middleman be replaced by another? The proponents of agricultural laws had no concrete answer.

The grievance redressal mechanism for contract farming was also criticized. The abolition of the power of civil courts and their replacement with a weak mechanism headed by sub-divisional magistrates threatened to become a serious impediment to the proper redressal of grievances. There were apprehensions that this could benefit corporate sponsors more than contract farmers.

It pointed to corporates

Finally, the overall thrust of agricultural laws appeared to encourage the participation of large corporate players in agricultural markets, not farmer-friendly organizations, such as cooperatives or farmer producer companies (FPCs). Particularly in the case of amendments to the Essential Commodities Act, there was reasonable doubt that a handful of corporate players would benefit substantially from investments in logistics, warehousing and warehousing.

Peasants’ protest started from states like Punjab and Haryana where Mandis There were institutions deeply rooted in the local economy and society. However, as the days passed, Movement spread in western Uttar Pradesh And from there to many other states. In a few months, the movement threatened to develop into a pan-India phenomenon, with local agricultural demands continually adding to the larger demand for repeal of agricultural laws. Such local adaptation of the movement greatly helped the mobilization cause. An unusually large number of women actively participated in the protests. Protests also took place in areas like western UP Threatened to bridge and repair communal fault lines was cultivated consciously after that Muzaffarnagar Riots of 2013, Many protesters were killed on the grounds of the protest, but support for the protest grew not only domestically, but also globally.

intolerance mentality

It was not only arrogance that marked the government’s response, but infantilism as well. When Pop Stars and Celebrities Rihanna tweeted an innocent comment about the protestThe entire machinery of the Ministry of External Affairs was woken up an unusually disproportionate response, Indian embassies were asked to propagate that he and other celebrities were campaigners who had irresponsibly ganged up to defame progress in India. These responses showed nothing but a deeply disturbing authoritarian mindset of intolerance and insecurity.

Repealing agricultural laws has, at least temporarily, put an end to an ugly and remarkably avoidable chapter of confrontation between the central government and farmers. However, the momentum that the movement has left will certainly remain. The movement has positively politicized many agricultural demands, including the need for stable markets and remunerative prices. There is a growing belief that committed conflict matters and that even aggressive governments can be forced to kneel. New rural mobilization is likely to emerge and grow around demands to address the large and persistent agrarian crisis. We are definitely in for interesting times.

R Ramkumar is Professor at Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai