The new farm bills and the widening of the rift between Centre and states

Ties between the Union and the states, which were already strained over GST compensation and proposed amendments to MMDRA, could become much worse with the advent of these farm bills

A few days back, amid the turmoil over the controversial farm bills, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee sprung a surprise when she toned down her stringent opposition to another pet project of the Modi government, the PM-KISAN scheme. Banerjee agreed to implement the programme, but only if the funds were routed through the state and not directly transferred from the Centre.

Though the Central government turned down the request immediately on the grounds that the scheme’s guidelines do not permit such a mechanism, Banerjee's offer does reflect a significant change in stance and is a growing example of the  politicisation of Centre-State relationships.

West Bengal Governor Jagdeep Dhankar, who has a long standing feud with the state government, was quick to respond saying that West Bengal needs to explain why it wants PM-KISAN money routed through the state exchequer.

Ever since the PM-KISAN scheme was launched in 2018, barely months before the 2019 General Elections, West Bengal has been among the few states that has declined to share the list of beneficiary farmers with the Centre, making the programme inoperative in the state.

Under PM-KISAN, all identified beneficiaries are eligible to get income support of Rs 6,000 a year, distributed in three installments of Rs 2,000 each.

The Centre claims that ever since the scheme started, over Rs 90,000 crore has been directly transferred into the bank account of almost 110 million farmers without any intermediaries.

West Bengal, which has steadfastly opposed the implementation of the Centre’s schemem contends that it has its own version of income support under which all farmers are eligible for a grant of Rs 5,000 per acre, along with a Rs 2 lakh cover if the farmer dies of any natural calamity.

The scheme covers all the almost 7.5 million farmers in the state.

But when It comes to implementing the Centre’s PM-KISAN scheme, West Bengal has been opposed to that on the grounds that it has a better and more effective income support for farmers.

The newly passed farm legislations give it another handle to nullify or stall the Central scheme and there are strong rumours that West Bengal might join Punjab and other states in challenging the legality of the bills.

Trinamool Congress leader Derek O'Brien has been at the forefront of the protests against the farmers bills in Rajya Sabha and was among the main protagonists of the ruckus in the Upper House during the passage of the Bills.

For the Central government, PM-KISAN and the new legislations could become tools through which it can claim that the Opposition parties are hand-in-glove with middlemen and commission agents.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has akready stated several times in public that those opposing the legislation are cahoots with middlemen and commission agents who exploit farmers.

He has also repeatedly said that the PM-KISAN scheme is meant to provide direct relief to farmers, cutting the network of the go-between.

In the case of West Bengal, the ruling party has been saying that the state does not allow the scheme to operate in its territory as it does not want its farmers to get extra benefits.

BJP’s contention is that Banerjee has shown a slight softening of stand as there is immense pressure from the state’s farming community to let them avail the extra benefits of PM-KISAN over and above the state’s Rs 5,000-per-acre support.

They also argue that with PM-KISAN, Modi has managed to grab a sizeable chunk of small and marginal farmers' support--a reason perhaps why the current opposition to the farm bills is concentrated in the three states of Punjab, Haryana and west Uttar Pradesh, where farmers have large land holdings and have a per capita income which is higher than other parts of the country.

How true this is will be known in the next few months and will also vastly depend on the spread of the current farmers’ agitation against the bills.

PM-KISAN has even on previous occasions been an instrument through which the Centre has tried reaching out to farmers directly.

In fact, before the Haryana polls of 2019 which were held barely months after the General Elections and where BJP performed poorly, unconfirmed reports said that all pending PM-KISAN transactions were cleared in a hurry while a massive drive was undertaken to enroll new farmers into the scheme.

The Centre and the State governments have been on a collision course not only over the farm bills but also many other matters such as GST compensation and the proposed amendments to the Mines and Minerals (Development and Regulation) Act, 1957 which aims to redefine illegal mining.

The fate of schemes such as PM-KISAN or even Garib Kalyan Yojana in non-BJP states hangs in balance.