Spotlight
New
Delhi, 3 June 2015
‘Man-Made
Bad Days For Agri Over’
New
Delhi, 3 June 2015, (INFA): It’s been a year of making amends for
the past decade of mismanagement of the agriculture sector (read UPA-I and II)
for the Modi-led government. Rather, had the leadership since Independence (barring Lal Bahadur Shastri and
Atal Behari Vajpayee) laid the necessary emphasis on agriculture the situation
wouldn’t be what it is today, lamented Union Agriculture Minister Radha Mohan
Singh.
With his turn to address the media
on “Mission Agriculture, One Year of Modi Sarkar”, the hands-on Minister Singh
with great ease and without erring spelt out the various initiatives taken by
his Ministry to turn the situation around and offer better days to the farmers.
While he had no hold on nature’s vagaries, man-made ‘bure din’ (bad days) were over and he exuberated confidence saying
achche din (good days) were indeed
ahead. This according to him was solely due to Modi’s wisdom i.e. the earth is
not just a piece of land but is our mother and we must take care of her. He
also subtly drove home the point that ‘India
is not Italy’--
its vast expanse in comparison needs water and the Pradhan Mantri Krishi
Sinchai Yojana is determined to creating sources of assured irrigation. The
Centre has earmarked Rs 5300 crore for this year to roll out the scheme.
Singh was also by and large
confident that the Centre was well-prepared to handle the drought threat
looming large. There is a contingency plan in place. More so, as when they came
to power everyone was worried about deficient rainfall but with hard work the
damage was minimised. Emphasis has been laid on climate resilient agricultural
technologies in 100 climatically vulnerable districts and production of seeds
with ICAR which do not require too much water and less rainfall. This apart,
there is increase of 50 per cent seed subsidy and the much-awaited new crop
insurance scheme for farmers would be announced this year. At the same time,
the Centre would finally announce the Minimum Support Price in a fortnight.
The Ministry was also paying special
attention to soil health management (during 2-010-11 and 2012-13 assistance
provided was Rs 72.07 cr whereas in 2014-15 the govt released Rs 88 cr) and had
sanctioned 69 mobile testing laboratories as against 17 in previous years.
Further, Rs 200 cr was allocated for soil health cards. Additionally, it was
going all out to promote organic farming, but needed various State governments
cooperation.
Insofar as high prices of vegetables
were concerned, the Ministry has for the time being ensured that these are
checked at least for onions and potatoes. The Rs 500 cr-Price Stabilisation
Fund Scheme is expected to regulate price volatility through procurement by
State governments and Central agencies of selected produce, maintenance of
buffer stocks and regulated release into market. It is also expected to check hoarding.
Then plans are afoot to set up a
National Kisan Mandi, cutting across borders, where the farmer is spared
harassment to sell his produce at different fees and get licences at one mandi
to another. Importantly, the issue of
making urea available to the farmers is also on the Ministry’s agenda, with its
plans afoot to revive closed fertilizer units in some States.
Making a note of the increasing number
of suicides by farmers, Singh stated that efforts were on to set things right
for them. The Land Acquisition Bill would change the farmers’ lives and provide
their children jobs. He regretted that while farmers were being cheated by the
suited-booted and family in Haryana (read Robert Vadra) and roads were well
laid out in Gurgaon, Noida etc, no one was thinking of taking these inside to
the villages. It was his Government which was trying to bring prosperity to
villages.
The Minister also spelt out initiatives
to bring about ‘Blue revolution’ to take forward the fishery sector as well as
improve lives of the fishermen and their families. In addition, he stressed on
the National Gokul Mission to conserve and develop indigenous bovine breeds in
a focussed and scientific manner. On the occasion, the Ministry too released
its report card through booklets giving details of all initiatives. Trust, the
‘sustained efforts’ should raise ‘new hopes’. ---INFA
(Copyright,
India News and Feature Alliance)
|