PM Modi says new farm laws empower, open markets; attacks Opposition

In the backdrop of the farmers’ protests on the new central farm laws, Prime Minister Narendra Modi today asserted that the legislation was aimed at empowering farmers and providing them with bigger markets and better prices.

Addressing a public meeting in his parliamentary constituency of Varanasi, Modi accused the opposition of spreading misinformation and canards about the new farm laws, saying that those who shouldered a legacy of deceiving farmers were at it again.

Modi said the quality of Indian farm produce was known all over the world and the farmers were entitled to get access to bigger markets to increase their income. “The new farm laws not only provide better options to farmers to sell their produce at remunerative prices, but they also give a legal shield since the earlier laws prohibited the sale of agricultural produce outside of the notified mandis,” he said.

However, if any farmer still preferred selling in the mandi at the Minimum Support Price (MSP), the new law does not bar him/her from exercising this option too, he said.

“In fact, the government has been investing liberally in the mandis to modernise them,” he said, adding the government would not be pumping money in the notified mandis if this system were to be abolished.

Modi claimed his government had paid nearly Rs 49,000 crore for the procurement of pulses during 2014-19 at the MSP against the corresponding purchase of pulses worth only Rs 650 crore during the preceding regime (2009-14). Similarly, the procurement of paddy and wheat during the current regime was much higher than the previous government, he claimed.

He enumerated several central government farm-related schemes, including Pradhan Mantri Kisan Bima Yojana and Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana to hit back at the opposition parties, who, he claimed, were trying to scuttle the pro-farm decisions of his government.

“If a section of farmers has doubts about the new farm laws, we are working towards allaying their fears,” he said and added that the falsehood being spread by vested interests would soon be exposed.

“In the previous governments, the MSP was declared but there was little procurement with the result that the smallest farmers were the hardest hit. There were also grand talks of farm loan waivers, but the farmers never got any benefit,” he alleged.

Modi said there was black marketing of urea in earlier regimes, while the farmers were now getting adequate supply of fertilisers, even during the testing times of the coronavirus this year.

In Varanasi, Modi inaugurated a 73-km Varanasi-Prayagraj National Highway project. He is scheduled to later visit the Kashi Vishwanath temple and also attend the Dev Deepawali Mahotsav on the banks of river Ganga.